Compromise

How to spell compromise

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce compromise

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does compromise mean?

1. nounAn agreement reached when each side gives up part of what it wanted.
2. verbTo settle a dispute by mutual concession, or to expose something to danger or discredit.

Compromise in a sentence

• noun

  After hours of talks, the two managers reached a sensible compromise.

• verb

  Both unions agreed to compromise on the new shift pattern.

• noun

  Buying a smaller house was a compromise they could both live with.

• verb

  A single weak password can compromise the whole network.

Where does compromise come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin compromissum, a noun from the verb compromittere, which meant 'to make a mutual promise to accept an arbiter's decision'. It was built from com- 'together' and promittere 'to promise' (literally 'to send forward', from pro- 'forward' and mittere 'to send'). English took the word in the early 1400s through the Old French compromis, at first for a formal agreement to submit a dispute to arbitration. From there the meaning softened into the everyday sense of settling a quarrel by each side giving ground. The buried word 'promise' is the key to the spelling: once you see compromise as com- plus promise, the -ise ending and the single m fall into place, and unlike many verbs it keeps -ise in American English too because that ending comes from 'promise', not the Greek -ize.

How the word is built

• com- (together)
• promise (from Latin promittere: to promise)