aide-mémoire

[ eyd-mem-wahr; French ed-mey-mwar ]

noun

, plural aide-mé·moire.

1. a memorandum summarizing a discussion, agreement, or action.

aide-mémoire

/ ˈeɪd mɛmˈwɑː; ɛdmemwar /

noun

1. a note serving as a reminder
2. a summarized diplomatic communication

Word History and Origins

Origin of aide-mémoire¹

1840–50; < French: literally, (that which) aids (the) memory

Word History and Origins

Origin of aide-mémoire¹

from aider to help + mémoire memory

Example Sentences

When she travels, Gou takes notes of how she feels as a sort of aide-memoire.

From BBC

William Sealy Gosset, a statistician who worked for the Guinness brewery in Dublin, drew the following aide-mémoire in 1908 to remember which was which: a duck-billed platypus was platykurtic and the kissing kangaroos were leptokurtic.

From Literature

Much of it reads like an aide-memoire, quickly jotted notes one might return to later for a different sort of book.

From New York Times

How the toy-to-boy communication takes place, however, remains unclear for quite a while, because Malone refuses to part with his aide-mémoire.

From Washington Post

After all, if fashion teaches us anything, it is how easy it is to forget, even with a physical object left behind as an aide-mémoire.

From New York Times