Tenacity

How to spell tenacity

8 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce tenacity

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does tenacity mean?

1. nounThe quality of being determined and refusing to give up, even when something is difficult.

Tenacity in a sentence

• Her tenacity during the long negotiation finally won the contract.

• The rescue team showed remarkable tenacity in the freezing conditions.

Where does tenacity come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word comes from the Latin tenacitas, meaning 'the quality of holding fast', which was built on the adjective tenax, 'gripping' or 'clinging', itself derived from the verb tenere, meaning simply 'to hold'. English took it in during the early 1500s, at first in the literal sense of a substance being sticky or able to hold together, and only later in the figurative sense of a person who refuses to let go of a goal. The same tenere root quietly holds together a whole family of English words, including 'tenant' (one who holds a property), 'tenure', 'retain', and 'contain'. Remembering that the heart of the word is 'ten' (hold) helps explain why it is spelled with a single c, since the soft c sound here belongs to the suffix -acity rather than to any doubling.

How the word is built

• ten- (from tenere: to hold)
• -acity (noun suffix meaning the quality of being)