[n. of action f. L. cumulāre: see CUMULATE.]
1. The action of heaping up or collecting in masses; an instance of such action; also, a gathered mass, a heap; accumulation, gathering, Chiefly fig.
1616. Bullokar, Cumulation, a heaping up, or increasing.
1625. Shirley, Love-tricks, III. v. I … wish you all cumulations of prosperity.
1794. Paley, Evid., I. II. i. § 4. This proof … is properly a cumulation of evidence, by no means a naked or solitary record.
1868. Lowell, Shakesp. Once More, Prose Wks. 1890, III. 42. It is by suggestion, not cumulation, that profound impressions are made upon the imagination.
1892. Contemp. Rev., May, 711. This will depend … on the quality of the particles which form the cumulation.
† 2. In English Univ. = ACCUMULATION 3. Obs.
1641. Laud, Hist. Chancellorsh. Oxf., 17 (T.). For cumulation, I must needs profess, I never liked it. And it supposes, of and in itself, an unnecessary delay of the first degree, or a needless haste of the second.
3. Civil Law. The combination or joining of two or more actions or defences in a single proceeding. Used in Louisiana, and formerly in Scotland.
1645. State Trials, Sir Rob. Spotiswood (R.). The defender denies any such custom; but, by the contrary, defences have severally, and without cumulation, been proponed and discussed, as in Ochiltry’s process.
1889. in Cent. Dict. for Louisiana.
