climate
pronunciation
How to pronounce climate in British English:
UK [ˈklaɪmət]
How to pronounce climate in American English:
US [ˈklaɪmət]
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- Noun:
- the weather in some location averaged over some long period of time
- the prevailing psychological state
Word Origin
- climate
- climate: [14] The notion underlying climate is of ‘sloping’ or ‘leaning’. It comes, via Old French climat or late Latin clīma (whence English clime [16]), from Greek klīma ‘sloping surface of the earth’, which came ultimately from the same source (the Indo-European base *kli-) as produced English lean. Greek geographers assigned the earth’s surface to various zones according to the angle which their ‘slope’ made with the rays of the sun (originally there were seven of these, ranging from 17 degrees of latitude North to 48 degrees, but later the system was elaborated so that each hemisphere was divided into 24 bands or ‘climates’ of latitude).This was the sense in which the word passed into Latin, where it broadened out into simply ‘region’, and hence ‘weather associated with a particular area’.=> ladder, lean
- climate (n.)
- late 14c., "horizontal zone of the earth," Scottish, from Old French climat "region, part of the earth," from Latin clima (genitive climatis) "region; slope of the Earth," from Greek klima "region, zone," literally "an inclination, slope," thus "slope of the Earth from equator to pole," from root of klinein "to slope, to lean" (see lean (v.)). The angle of sun on the slope of the Earth's surface defined the zones assigned by early geographers. Early references in English, however, are in astrology works, as each of the seven (then) climates was held to be under the influence of one of the planets. Shift from "region" to "weather associated with a region" perhaps began in Middle English, certainly by c. 1600.
Synonym
Example
- 1. Climate change will cause mass migration .
- 2. In the bracing climate of the bronx , such problems seem distant .
- 3. Obviously , the sexual climate was very different in 1974 .
- 4. Or is the current climate merely a blip in an otherwise relatively smooth upward trajectory ?
- 5. Marine ecosystems lost their regulatory abilities , and changes in climate and weather followed .