Separation

How to spell separation

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce separation

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does separation mean?

1. nounThe act of setting two or more things apart, or the state of being kept apart.
2. nounA formal arrangement in which a married couple live apart without ending the marriage.

Separation in a sentence

• The recycling rules require careful separation of glass and plastic.

• After the separation, they agreed to share custody of the children.

• A thin wall provides the only separation between the two offices.

• Their solicitor drafted a separation agreement covering the finances.

Where does separation come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin separatio, the noun built from the verb separare, meaning 'to set apart' or 'to divide'. That verb was itself formed from se-, meaning 'apart' or 'aside', joined to parare, meaning 'to prepare, arrange or make ready', so the literal idea was 'to make ready apart', that is, to put things in their own places. It travelled into English through Old French during the late 1300s, keeping its core sense of dividing one thing from another. The very same parare root sits inside everyday words such as 'prepare' and 'apparatus', and its first vowel is the reason 'separate' and 'separation' are spelled with an A in the middle rather than the E that the schwa sound tempts writers to use. Remembering that middle 'par' element, the same one in 'prepare', is the surest guard against the classic 'seperation' misspelling.

How the word is built

• se- (apart)
• par (from parare: to make ready, prepare)
• -ate
• -ion (noun-forming suffix)