Fermentation

How to spell fermentation

12 letters · 4 syllables

9 of the 106 people asked to spell fermentation in Spelling Garden got it wrong the first time.

How to pronounce fermentation

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does fermentation mean?

1. nounThe chemical breakdown of a substance by microorganisms such as yeast or bacteria, typically converting sugars into alcohol, acids, or gases.

Fermentation in a sentence

• The brewery monitors fermentation closely to control the alcohol content.

• Sourdough relies on slow fermentation to develop its tangy flavour.

Where does fermentation come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin fermentum, which meant 'leaven' or 'yeast', the agent that makes dough rise. That noun was itself built on the verb fervere, meaning 'to boil' or 'to seethe', because the bubbling of fermenting liquid looks very much like gentle boiling. Late Latin formed fermentatio for the process of leavening or souring, and English adopted it through Old French in the late fourteenth century, at first in alchemical and medical writing about substances that worked and bubbled. The same fervere root sits inside the modern words 'fervent' and 'fervour', both of which still carry that idea of heated, boiling intensity. The spelling stays close to the Latin: a single 'r', a single 'm', and the tidy '-ation' ending that English bolts onto so many process nouns.

How the word is built

• ferment (from Latin fermentum: leaven, yeast)
• -ation (noun-forming suffix denoting a process or action)