traffic

Reading level: hard

Estimated CEFR level: B2 — Upper-Intermediate

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

  1. noun the aggregation of things (pedestrians or vehicles) coming and going in a particular locality during a specified period of time
  2. noun buying and selling; especially illicit trade
  3. noun the amount of activity over a communication system during a given period of time

Etymology

From Middle French trafique, traffique (“traffic”), from Italian traffico (“traffic”) from trafficare (“to carry on trade”). Potentially from Vulgar Latin *trānsfrīcāre (“to rub across”); Klein instead suggests the Italian has ultimate origin in Arabic تَفْرِيق (tafrīq, “distribution, dispersion”), reshaped to match the native prefix tra- (“trans-”). The adjectival sense is possibly influenced by Tagalog trapik and follows a general trend in Philippine English to construct a noun from an adjective.

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