temperament

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English temperament, also temprament,^[2] borrowed from Latin temperāmentum (“due mixture, a mixing in due proportion”),^{[3][4][5][6][2]} from temperō (“to mix in due proportion, blend, regulate”), the source of temper,^[4][7][6] with the suffix -mentum.^[7][8] French tempérament is recorded from the 16th century.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The moderating of a quality in the body, or a balanced mixture of elements: before 1398, in Trevisa's translation of Bartholomaeus Anglicus.^[2][5] Etymonline dates the word to the late 14th century,^[4] while the OED, whose entry has not been fully revised, first records it before 1412 in Lydgate.^[3] The Oxford Dictionary of English notes that in early use it meant the same as the noun temper.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In medieval alchemy and natural philosophy the word meant the combination of the qualities hot, cold, moist and dry that was thought to fix the nature of a body (from 1471).^[5][3][4] Medieval physiology applied it to the mixture of the four humours, sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic and melancholic, whose proportion was held to decide a person's physical and mental make-up, and the idea survives in phrases such as a phlegmatic temperament.^[5][4][3] Johnson (1755) still defined it as "constitution; state with respect to the predominance of any quality".^[10] The general sense "habit of mind, natural disposition" is first recorded in Byron's Don Juan in 1821.^[5][4][3] Another line of senses kept the Latin idea of tempering: moderation (1475), a middle course (1604) and a compromise (1660).^[3] Trench pointed out that Latin temperāmentum could mean a middle term reached by mutual concession, and quoted Milton and Burke using temperament that way.^[11] In music, from 1728, it is the adjusting of the intervals of the scale on keyboard instruments.^[3] The adjective temperamental (1646) took on the sense "moody, erratic" in 1907.^[5]

Timeline

• before 1398 – the moderating of a quality in the body; a balanced mixture of elements.^[2][5] The OED's first record is from Lydgate, before 1412.^[3]
• 1471 – the combination of hot, cold, moist and dry that fixes the nature of a body, in Ripley's Compound of Alchymy (obsolete by 1676).^[3][5]
• 1475 – moderation, mitigation (obsolete or archaic).^[3]
• 1583 – the character of the weather or climate (obsolete or archaic).^[3]
• 1604 – a middle course between extremes, in Cawdrey's Table Alphabeticall.^[3]
• 1628 – the balance of the four humours in the body, which shaped a person's constitution.^[3]
• 1660 – adjustment, compromise.^[3]
• 1728 – in music, the adjustment of the intervals of the scale, in Chambers's Cyclopædia.^[3]
• 1821 – habit of mind, natural disposition, in Byron's Don Juan.^[3][5][4]
• 1855 – verb, to give someone a temperament, in Emerson.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person's natural character and disposition, as shown in the way they react and behave: He has a calm, patient temperament.^[12][7][3]
2. Excitability, moodiness or quick anger, especially when shown openly: a conductor famous for his temperament.^[12]
3. In music, an adjustment of the intervals between the notes of an instrument of fixed pitch, such as a keyboard, so that it can play in different keys; also any system of such tuning, such as equal temperament.^[12][3]
4. In medieval physiology, the balance of the four humours in the body, thought to decide a person's constitution.^[3][4][5]
5. (obsolete, 1412–1684) The mixture or balance of the elements or qualities of a substance or body; constitution.^[7][3][10]
6. (archaic) A middle course; a compromise.^[3][11]

Word family

• equal temperament
• temperamental
• temperamentally
• temperamented

Related words

• temper
• temperate
• temperature
• temperance

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
7. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ a b Trench, Richard Chenevix (1859), A Select Glossary of English Words Used Formerly in Senses Different from Their Present, London: John W. Parker
12. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins