pulsation

Borrowed from Middle French pulsacion, and its source, Latin pulsātiō (“a beating or striking”).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /pʌlˈseɪʃn̩/

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• (US) IPA^(key): /pəlˈseɪʃən/
• Rhymes: -eɪʃən

pulsation (countable and uncountable, plural pulsations)

1. The regular throbbing of the heart, an artery etc. in a living body; the pulse. [from 15th c.]
   • 1844, Edgar Allan Poe, ‘The Premature Burial’:

     Pulsation had ceased. For three days the body was preserved unburied, during which it had acquired a stony rigidity.

2. Any rhythmic beating, throbbing etc. [from 17th c.]
3. (now rare) Physical striking; a blow. [from 17th c.]
   • 1765–1769, William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, (please specify |book=I to IV), Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] Clarendon Press, OCLC 65350522:

     By the Cornelian law, pulsation as well as verberation is prohibited.

4. A single beat, throb or vibration. [from 19th c.]

• platinous

From Latin pulsātiō.

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pulsation f (plural pulsations)

1. pulsation

• “pulsation”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.