a figure of speech in which a word for a part is used to mean the whole, e.g. 50 sail instead of 50 ships, or the whole to mean a part, e.g. in ‘Leeds defeated Stoke’
synecdochic /-ʹdokik/ adj
synecdochical /-ʹdokikl/ adj
synecdochically /-ʹdokikli/ adv
[via Latin from Greek synekdochē, from syn- + ekdochē sense, interpretation, from ekdechesthai to receive, understand, from ex-2 + dechesthai to receive]