means A contract in which you pay regular sums to a company that agrees to compensate you for specified losses — accidents, illness, death, disaster — if they occur.

from From the Old French enseurer, 'to make sure,' a variant of assurer (to assure), built on Latin securus — 'free from care,' from se- (without) plus cura (care). So at its root, insurance literally promised to make you carefree. The two words 'assurance' and 'insurance' lived as near-twins for centuries; British practice eventually nudged 'assurance' toward life policies and 'insurance' toward everything else, though the line was never tidy.