what does "endowment" should mean exactly?

Read all warbreaker and didn't quite understand the shard's name. Ruin wants to destroy, so hemalurgy. Preservation wants to preserve, so allomancy and feruchemy (don't understand these one also)? Honor is about oaths, so ten orders of knights radiant. But what's the connection between the breaths and Endowment exactly? Maybe it is obvious and I can't understand because english is not my first language, so I'd love some light on the matter.