noun

• (literary, rare) The act of dotating or bestowing something; endowment, or an instance of this.
  "Neyther is it to bee forgotten, that this dedicating of Foundations and Dotations to profeſſory Learning, hath not onely had a Maligne aſpect, and influence vpon the growth of Scyences, but hath alſo been preiudiciall to States and gouernments."
• (historical, usually italicized) A grant of revenues from territory conquered by the French Empire (c. 1804–1814).
  "Jérôme [Napoléon Bonaparte] gave the dotations away to favorites. […] Dotations were the revenues, but almost invariably not the source from which such sums were drawn, settled by a ruling monarch upon those delegated to represent his authority, in order that they might maintain both their clerical staff, if they had one, and the proper splendor of their office. They took the form of such things as one-tenth the profits from farming the tobacco tax, a lien against postal charges, the privilege of selling certain offices, or hearth money. They were an inevitable source of personal and administrative corruption."