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Temper vs Temperment - What's the difference?

temper | temperment |

As nouns the difference between temper and temperment

is that temper is a tendency to be of a certain type of mood while temperment is .

As a verb temper

is to moderate or control.

temper

English

(wikipedia temper)

Alternative forms

* tempre (obsolete)

Noun

(en noun)
  • A tendency to be of a certain type of mood.
  • * , chapter=8
    • , title= Mr. Pratt's Patients , passage=Afore we got to the shanty Colonel Applegate stuck his head out of the door. His temper had been getting raggeder all the time, and the sousing he got when he fell overboard had just about ripped what was left of it to ravellings.}}
  • State of mind.
  • * 1719- (Daniel Defoe), (Robinson Crusoe)
  • The state of any compound substance which results from the mixture of various ingredients; due mixture of different qualities.
    • the temper of mortar
  • (obsolete) Constitution of body; the mixture or relative proportion of the four humours: blood, choler, phlegm, and melancholy.
  • * Fuller
    • The exquisiteness of his [Christ's] bodily temper increased the exquisiteness of his torment.
  • The heat treatment to which a metal or other material has been subjected; a material that has undergone a particular heat treatment.
  • Calmness of mind; moderation; equanimity; composure.
    • to keep one's temper
  • * Alexander Pope
    • To fall with dignity, with temper rise.
  • * Ben Jonson
    • Restore yourselves to your tempers , fathers.
  • The state of a metal or other substance, especially as to its hardness, produced by some process of heating or cooling.
    • the temper of iron or steel
  • Middle state or course; mean; medium.
  • * Macaulay
    • The perfect lawgiver is a just temper between the mere man of theory, who can see nothing but general principles, and the mere man of business, who can see nothing but particular circumstances.
  • (sugar manufacture, historical) Milk of lime, or other substance, employed in the process formerly used to clarify sugar.

    • Derived terms

    * lose one's temper * short temper * short-tempered

    Synonyms

    * (tendency of mood) disposition

    Coordinate terms

    * (Heat treatment) quenching

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To moderate or control.
    • Temper your language around children.
  • To strengthen or toughen a material, especially metal, by heat treatment; anneal.
    • Tempering is a heat treatment technique applied to metals, alloys, and glass to achieve greater toughness by increasing the strength of materials and/or ductility. Tempering is performed by a controlled reheating of the work piece to a temperature below its lower eutectic critical temperature.
  • * Dryden
    • The tempered metals clash, and yield a silver sound.
  • To spices in ghee or oil to release essential oils for flavouring a dish in South Asian cuisine.
  • To mix clay, plaster or mortar with water to obtain the proper consistency.
  • (music) To adjust, as the mathematical scale to the actual scale, or to that in actual use.
  • (obsolete, Latinism) To govern; to manage.
  • * Spenser
    • With which the damned ghosts he governeth, / And furies rules, and Tartare tempereth .
  • (archaic) To combine in due proportions; to constitute; to compose.
  • * 1610 , , act 3 scene 3
    • You fools! I and my fellows
    Are ministers of fate: the elements
    Of whom your swords are temper'd may as well
    Wound the loud winds, or with bemock'd-at stabs
    Kill the still-closing waters, as diminish
    One dowle that's in my plume;
  • (archaic) To mingle in due proportion; to prepare by combining; to modify, as by adding some new element; to qualify, as by an ingredient; hence, to soften; to mollify; to assuage.
  • * Bancroft
    • Puritan austerity was so tempered by Dutch indifference, that mercy itself could not have dictated a milder system.
  • * Otway
    • Woman! lovely woman! nature made thee / To temper man: we had been brutes without you.
  • * Byron
    • But thy fire / Shall be more tempered , and thy hope far higher.
  • * Addison
    • She [the Goddess of Justice] threw darkness and clouds about her, that tempered the light into a thousand beautiful shades and colours.
  • (obsolete) To fit together; to adjust; to accommodate.
  • * Bible, Wisdom xvi. 21
    • Thy sustenance serving to the appetite of the eater, tempered itself to every man's liking.

    External links

    * *

    temperment

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)