Civilized

How to spell civilized

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce civilized

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does civilized mean?

1. adjectiveDescribing a society or culture that has reached an advanced stage of social, legal, and cultural organisation.
2. adjectivePolite, reasonable, and well mannered in behaviour.

Civilized in a sentence

• Historians debate when the first civilized communities formed along the rivers.

• The two managers settled their dispute in a calm and civilized manner.

• A civilized nation invests in schools, courts, and public health.

• Even during the heated meeting, everyone stayed civilized and let each speaker finish.

Where does civilized come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin civilis, meaning 'relating to citizens or to the public life of a community', which itself grew from civis, the ordinary Latin word for a citizen or townsperson. The same civis root gives us 'city', 'civic', and 'civilian', all tied to the idea of organised communal living. The verb 'civilize' arrived in English in the early 1600s by way of French civiliser, carrying the sense of bringing people into an ordered, lawful social state rather than a rough or wild one. The adjective 'civilized' then described a society or person shaped by that refinement, and over time it softened into the everyday meaning of polite, reasonable, and well mannered. The spelling trap sits in the middle: the unstressed second syllable sounds like a vague 'uh', so writers reach for an 'a' or 'e' when the root civil actually demands an 'i'.

How the word is built

• civil- (from Latin civilis: relating to citizens)
• -ize (verb-forming suffix)
• -d (past participle/adjective ending)

British and American spelling

Civilized is the American spelling. British English spells it civilised.