commercial

Etymology

commerce + -ial. From French commercial (“of, or pertaining to commerce”), from Late Latin commercialis, from Latin commercium.

noun

1. An advertisement in a common media format, usually radio or television.
   She was in a commercial for breakfast cereal.
2. (finance) A commercial trader, as opposed to an individual speculator.
3. (obsolete) A commercial traveller.
   I have more than once had to lend a commercial money to pay his fare home; as he had played shell-out and lost the lot. 1875, George Worsley, Advice to the Young!, page 32
4. (slang) A male prostitute.
   Tom said that homosexuals hate “commercials,” male prostitutes, and if the homosexual was drunk and angry, he might have committed murder. 1972, Alfred Eustace Parker, The Berkeley Police Story, page 133
   With the commercials there is no intensity of feeling and no later animosity; there is emotional and sexual fakery, but no prolonged post-sexual bargaining. […] Paradoxically these boys dissociate themselves from the commercials, yet engage in prostitution only when they require the money. 1987, Paul William Mathews, Male Prostitution: Two Monographs, page 39

adj

1. Of or pertaining to commerce.
2. (aviation) Designating an airport that serves passenger and/or cargo flights.
3. (aviation) Designating such an airplane flight.