Inspiration

How to spell inspiration

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce inspiration

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does inspiration mean?

1. nounThe process of being mentally stimulated to feel, think, or create something, or the source of that stimulus.
2. nounThe drawing of air into the lungs; the act of breathing in.

Inspiration in a sentence

• The coastal walk gave her the inspiration for her next novel.

• The nurse measured the patient's rate of inspiration during the exam.

• After weeks of struggling, the designer finally found fresh inspiration.

• Each inspiration filled the diver's lungs before the descent.

Where does inspiration come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb inspirare, which literally meant 'to breathe into' or 'to blow upon', formed from in- meaning 'into' and spirare meaning 'to breathe'. In early religious usage it described a divine breath that filled a person with knowledge or purpose, the idea that a god could breathe ideas directly into a human mind. English took it through Old French inspiracion in the 1300s, and the figurative sense of a sudden creative or mental stimulus gradually became the dominant meaning. The same spirare root breathes through a whole family of English words, including respiration, perspire, conspire, and spirit. Knowing that buried verb spir helps with the spelling: it is 'in' plus 'spir' plus the regular '-ation' ending, never an 'e' in the middle.

How the word is built

• in- (in, into)
• spir (from spirare: to breathe)
• -ation (noun of action)