Momentary

How to spell momentary

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce momentary

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does momentary mean?

1. adjectiveLasting for only a very short time; brief and quickly over.

Momentary in a sentence

• The power cut caused only a momentary delay to the meeting.

• She felt a momentary flash of doubt before signing the contract.

Where does momentary come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin momentarius, meaning 'lasting only a moment', which was built on momentum, a noun for a movement or a brief instant of time. The Latin momentum itself was a worn-down form of movimentum, from the verb movere 'to move', because the smallest moment was thought of as the tiny movement a balance makes when it tips. English absorbed momentary in the late 1400s with the sense of something fleeting and quickly over. The shared root explains why momentary, moment, and momentum all carry the idea of motion and passing time. The spelling trap sits in the unstressed ending, where the e of -ment can be skipped and the -ary can be mistaken for -ery, so it helps to remember the base word 'moment' is preserved whole before -ary is added.

How the word is built

• moment (from Latin momentum: movement, instant)
• -ary (adjective suffix: relating to)