Rotate

How to spell rotate

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce rotate

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does rotate mean?

1. verbTo turn around a central point or axis.
2. verbTo alternate people or things in a regular sequence.

Rotate in a sentence

• The engineer showed how the blades rotate when the motor starts.

• The staff rotate the weekend shifts so nobody is overburdened.

• You can rotate the image ninety degrees before printing it.

• Farmers rotate their crops to keep the soil healthy.

Where does rotate come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word comes directly from the Latin verb rotare, which meant 'to turn in a circle' or 'to whirl about'. That verb was built on the noun rota, the ordinary Latin word for a wheel, so the original mental image is literally a wheel spinning on its axle. English adopted rotate in the early 1700s, at first in scientific and astronomical writing to describe a body turning on its axis, and only later in the everyday sense of taking turns or alternating. The same rota root survives in modern English in words like 'rotary', 'rotor' and the office 'rota' (a duty roster), and even in 'roulette', whose little wheel turns the same way. Because the spelling follows the Latin so faithfully, the single t and the plain -ate ending rarely trip writers up.

How the word is built

• rot- (from Latin rota: wheel)
• -ate (verb-forming suffix)