Temperature

How to spell temperature

11 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce temperature

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does temperature mean?

1. nounThe degree of heat or cold of a body, substance, or environment, usually measured on a scale such as Celsius or Fahrenheit.

Temperature in a sentence

• The temperature dropped overnight.

• The temperature has dropped sharply tonight.

Where does temperature come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word comes from the Latin temperatura, meaning 'a mixing in proportion' or 'a tempering', which was built on the verb temperare, 'to mix correctly, to moderate or regulate'. In its earliest English use during the 1500s it kept this older sense of a balanced blending or a moderate condition, much like the related word 'temperament', which describes a person's settled blend of qualities. Only later, as instruments for measuring heat developed in the 1600s and 1700s, did 'temperature' settle into its modern meaning of the degree of hotness or coldness of something. The same temperare root also gives us 'temper', 'temperate', and 'distemper', all sharing the idea of mixing or moderating. The spelling trap lives in the middle: the unstressed '-pera-' often collapses in speech to a quick 'pra', so writers drop the second vowel, but the original Latin temperare keeps that 'e' firmly in place.

How the word is built

• temper- (from Latin temperare: to mix in proportion, moderate)
• -ature (noun suffix forming a state or condition)