parcel [ME] Latin particula ‘small part’, from pars source of *part, has given us parcel. In early use it shared with part the notion of something forming a section of a larger whole, as in a parcel of land. This survives in contexts such as part and parcel [LME], and to parcel out. The modern sense developed in the mid 16th century and initially concentrated on its contents, which would usually be a quantity of a substance or a number of goods wrapped up in a single package.