1. Furnishing aid; assisting; auxiliary; helping; tributary; especially, aiding in an inferior position or capacity; as, a subsidiary stream. Chief ruler and principal head everywhere, not suffragant and subsidiary. Florio. They constituted a useful subsidiary testimony of another state of existence. Coleridge.
2. Of or pertaining to a subsidy; constituting a subsidy; being a part of, or of the nature of, a subsidy; as, subsidiary payments to an ally. George the Second relied on his subsidiary treaties. Ld. Mahon.
SUBSIDIARY
Sub*sid"i*a*ry, n.; pl. Subsidiaries (.
Defn: One who, or that which, contributes aid or additional supplies; an assistant; an auxiliary. Hammond.
SUBSIDIZE
Sub"si*dize, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Subsidized; p. pr. & vb. n.
Subsidizing.] Etym: [From Subsidy.]
Defn: To furnish with a subsidy; to purchase the assistance of by the payment of a subsidy; to aid or promote, as a private enterprise, with public money; as, to subsidize a steamship line. He employed the remittances from Spain to subsidize a large body of German mercenaries. Prescott.
SUBSIDY Sub"si*dy, n.; pl. Subsidies. Etym: [L. subsidium the troops stationed in reserve in the third line of battlem reserve, support, help, fr. subsidere to sit down, lie in wait: cf. F. subside. See Subside.]
1. Support; aid; coöperation; esp., extraordinary aid in money rendered to the sovereign or to a friendly power. They advised the king to send speedy aids, and with much alacrity granted a great rate of subsidy. Bacon.
Note: Subsidies were taxes, not immediately on on property, but on persons in respect of their reputed estates, after the nominal rate of 4s. the pound for lands, and 2s. 8d. for goods. Blackstone.
2. Specifically: A sum of money paid by one sovereign or nation to another to purchase the coöperation or the neutrality of such sovereign or nation in war.