[f. med.L. allocāt- ppl. stem of allocāre; f. al-, ad- to + locāre to place.] Formerly only in Scottish writers; not in J. or T.
1. To set or lay apart for a special purpose, to apportion, assign, to give one as his special portion or share.
1640–1. Kirkcudbr. War-Comm. Min. Bk. (1855), 157. To allot and allocate to thame and ilk ane of thame … ane competent localitie.
1733. P. Lindsay, Int. Scotl., 23. This Meeting may then appoint and allocate such a Proportion of the Poors Money.
1821. De Quincey, Confess. (1862), 68. That very sum which the Manchester Grammar School allocated to every student.
1872. E. Robertson, Hist. Ess., 251. A system of allocating the public revenues amongst wealthy capitalists.
2. To attach locally.
1842. De Quincey, in Page, Life, I. xv. 332. Lasswade, to which nominally we allocate ourselves.
3. To fix the locality of, localize.
1881. Lockyer, in Nature, 28 July, 298/1. We can allocate the absorption of the hydrogen, magnesium, and so on; we can see where they are absorbing. Ibid., 4 Aug., 317/1. Kirchhoff allocated the region where the absorption which produces the reversal of the iron lines took place at a considerable height in the atmosphere of the sun.
