Primed

How to spell primed

6 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce primed

What does primed mean?

1. adjectiveMade fully ready or prepared in advance for a particular action or situation.
2. adjectiveTreated with a first base coat of sealant or paint so a finishing coat will adhere.

Primed in a sentence

• The sales team felt fully primed for the morning pitch.

• The bare plaster had been primed before the colour was rolled on.

• After weeks of rehearsal the cast was primed for opening night.

• Every panel arrives primed so the workshop only needs to apply the topcoat.

Where does primed come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the past form of the verb 'prime', which traces back to the Latin primus, meaning 'first' or 'foremost'. In medieval English 'prime' first named the earliest canonical hour of prayer at daybreak, the very start of the day, and the sense of being 'first in order or quality' grew out of that. By the 1500s 'to prime' had developed practical meanings: to load a firearm with the first charge of powder, and later to lay down a first coat of paint or sealant so a later coat would hold. The figurative idea of getting something ready in advance, of being made fully prepared, springs from these hands-on senses. The spelling keeps the silent 'e' of 'prime' hidden inside the form, since the 'e' is simply dropped before the '-ed' ending.

How the word is built

• prim(e) (from Latin primus: first, of the highest quality)
• -ed (past tense / past participle suffix)