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Ransom vs Compensation - What's the difference?

ransom | compensation |

As nouns the difference between ransom and compensation

is that ransom is money paid for the freeing of a hostage while compensation is the act or principle of compensating.

As a verb ransom

is to deliver, especially in context of sin or relevant penalties.

ransom

English

(wikipedia ransom)

Noun

(en-noun)
  • Money paid for the freeing of a hostage.
    • They were held for two million dollars ransom .
    They were held to ransom .
  • * 1674 , , Paradise Lost , Book XII:
    • Thy ransom paid, which man from death redeems.
  • * Sir J. Davies
    • His captivity in Austria, and the heavy ransom he paid for his liberty.
  • * 2010 , Caroline Alexander, The War That Killed Achilles: The True Story of Homer's Iliad :
    • As rich as was the ransom Priam paid for Hektor, Hermes says, his remaining sons at Troy “'would give three times as much ransom / for you, who are alive, were Atreus' son Agamemnon / to recognize you.'”
  • The release of a captive, or of captured property, by payment of a consideration.
    • prisoners hopeless of ransom
    (Dryden)
  • (historical, legal, UK) A sum paid for the pardon of some great offence and the discharge of the offender; also, a fine paid in lieu of corporal punishment.
    • (Blackstone)

    Usage notes

    * (term) is much more common in the US, (to) in the UK.

    Derived terms

    * king's ransom

    Verb

  • To deliver, especially in context of sin or relevant penalties.
  • To pay a price to set someone free from captivity or punishment.
    • to ransom prisoners from an enemy
  • To exact a ransom for, or a payment on.
    • Such lands as he had rule of he ransomed them so grievously, and would tax the men two or three times in a year. — Berners.

    See also

    * bail

    References

    Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary: Tenth Edition 1997

    Anagrams

    * * * * *

    compensation

    English

    (wikipedia compensation)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • The act or principle of compensating.
    • (Emerson)
  • That which constitutes, or is regarded as, an equivalent; that which makes good the lack or variation of something else; that which compensates for loss or privation; amends; remuneration; recompense.
  • * Hallam
    • The parliament which dissolved the monastic foundations vouchsafed not a word toward securing the slightest compensation to the dispossessed owners.
  • * Burke
    • No pecuniary compensation can possibly reward them.
  • The extinction of debts of which two persons are reciprocally debtors by the credits of which they are reciprocally creditors; the payment of a debt by a credit of equal amount; a set-off.
  • A recompense or reward for some loss or service.
  • An equivalent stipulated for in contracts for the sale of real estate, in which it is customary to provide that errors in description, etc., shall not avoid, but shall be the subject of compensation.
  • The relationship between air temperature outside a building and a calculated target temperature for provision of air or water to contained rooms or spaces for the purpose of efficient heating. In building control systems the compensation curve is defined to a compensator for this purpose.

    • Synonyms

    * (act of compensating) restitution * (recompense or reward) restitution

    Derived terms

    * overcompensation