Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Primate |
PrimateNoun1. A senior clergyman. 2. Any placental mammal of the order Primates; has good eyesight and flexible hands and feet. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "primate" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1791. (references) |
Etymology: Primate \Pri"mate\, noun. [from Old English expression primat, French primat, from Latin expression primas, -atis one of the first, chief, from primus the first. See Prime,]. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Satire | PRIMATE, n. The head of a church, especially a State church supported by involuntary contributions. The Primate of England is the Archbishop of Canterbury, an amiable old gentleman, who occupies Lambeth Palace when living and Westminster Abbey when dead. He is commonly dead. Source: Devil's Dictionary. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
For another meaning of the word Primate, see Primate (religion).
The primates are members of the Primates order of mammals. These include lemurs, monkeys, and apes (including humans). The English singular primate is a back-formation from the Latin name Primates, which itself was the plural of the Latin primas.
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Mammalia Families
- Suborder Strepsirhini (prosimians)
- Superfamily Lorisoidea
- Galagidae (galagos)
- Lorisidae (lorises and pottos)
- Daubentoniidae (aye-aye)
- Cheirogaleidae (dwarf lemurs and mouse lemurs)
- Superfamily Lemuroidea
- Megaladapidae
- Lemuridae (common lemurs)
- Superfamily Indrioidea
- Indridae
- Suborder Haplorhini (monkeys and apes)
- Superfamily Tarsioida
- Tarsiidae
- Superfamily Platyrrhini (New World monkeys)
- Callitrichidae
- Cebidae
- Superfamily Catarrhini
- Cercopithecidae (Old World monkeys)
- Hylobatidae (gibbons)
- Hominidae (great apes and humans)
All primates exhibit pentadactyly (they have five fingers), a generalized dental pattern, and a primitive (unspecialized) body plan. Another distinguishing feature of primates is fingernails. Opposing thumbs are also a defining primates feature, but are not limited to this order; opossums, for example, also have opposing thumbs. In primates, the combination of opposing thumbs, short fingernails (rather than claws) and long, inward-closing fingers is a relic of the ancestral practice of brachiating through trees. In this context, this mosaic of features was useful for grasping branches, especially mid-sized ones no thicker than three inches in diameter. Forward-facing color binocular vision was also useful for our brachiating ancestors, particularly for finding and collecting food. All primates, even those that lack the features typical of other primates (like lorises), share eye orbit characteristics that distinguish them from other taxonomic orders.
In primate species, the males have a larger figure than the females. The following is a table in kilogram (kg), pound (lb), gram (g), and ounce (oz).
Species Female Male Gorilla 105 kg (231 lb) 205 kg (452 lb) Human 52 kg (114 lb) 75 kg (165 lb) Patas monkey 5.5 kg (12 lb) 10 kg (22 lb) Proboscis Monkey 9 kg (20 lb) 19 kg (42 lb) Pygmy marmoset 120 g (4.2 oz) 140 g (5 oz) Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Primate."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
A primate in the Western Church is an archbishop or bishop who has authority not just over the bishops of his own province, as a Metropolitan does, but over a number of provinces, such as a national church. It corresponds to the title of Exarch of the Eastern Church.The title is often encountered in the churches of the Anglican Communion, which is divided into provinces each of which usually has a metropolitan. The senior metropolitan in the national church is called the primate, though this title was only in recent years added by the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States.
In England, however, the metropolitans of the two provinces of Canterbury and York, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Archbishop of York, are Primate of All England and Primate of England respectively. It reflects the compromise struck between the Archbishops of York (who wanted to emphasise the equality of the archbishops) and the Archbishops of Canterbury (who wanted to emphasise the seniority of Canterbury). In Ireland, both the Anglican Church of Ireland and the Roman Catholic Church style their respective Archbishops of Armagh and Archbishops of Dublin Primate of All Ireland and Primate of Ireland respectively.
In the Roman Catholic Church, the term is generally found in the older Catholic countries, and is now purely honorific. The title is typically vested in one of the oldest Archdioceses in a country, if it exists. The see city may no longer have the prominence it had when the diocese was created. In the United States the Archbishop of Baltimore is called "honorary primate", as most dioceses in the country trace their origin to Baltimore, which was first in the nation.
A selection of countries and their Roman Catholic primates:
- Brazil...Archbishop of Sao Salvador da Bahia
- Canada...Archbishop of Quebec
- France...Archbishop of Lyon ("Primate of the Gauls")
- Hungary...Archbishop of Esztergom-Budapest
- Poland...traditionally Archbishop of Gniezno,an exception for the incumbent Archbishop of Warsaw who headed both archdioceses until 1992
- Portugal...Patriarch of Lisbon
- Spain...Archbishop of Toledo
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Primate (religion)."
Synonyms: PrimateSynonyms: archpriest (n), hierarch (n), high priest (n), prelate (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Clergy | Dignitaries of the church; ecclesiarch, hierarch; ebdomarius; eminence, reverence, elder, primate, metropolitan, archbishop, bishop, prelate, diocesan, suffragan, dean, subdean, archdeacon, prebendary, canon, rural dean, rector, parson, vicar, perpetual curate, residentiary, beneficiary, incumbent, chaplain, curate; deacon, deaconess; preacher, reader, lecturer; capitular; missionary, propagandist, Jesuit, revivalist, field preacher. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Primate |
| English words defined with "primate": Aegyptopithecus, Algeripithecus minutus, anthropoid, ape, Archprimate ♦ Canterbury, Cross-bearer ♦ genus Kenyapithecus ♦ hominid, hominoid, Homo sapiens ♦ Kenyapithecus ♦ primateship, Primatical ♦ tarsier ♦ ventral. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "primate": Adenoviruses, Simian ♦ Immune Adherence Reaction ♦ Mason-Pfizer Monkey Virus ♦ Short Interspersed Nucleotide Elements, SIV ♦ Vomeronasal Organ. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "primate": Archprimate. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Primate" is also a word in the following languages with English translations in parentheses. French (primate), Italian (primate), Spanish (primate). |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | You count every one when you're locked away like a primate. (Men in Black II; writing credit: Lowell Cunningham; Robert Gordon) Here is the primate example (Can't Buy Me Love; writing credit: Michael Swerdlick) | |
Movie/TV Titles | Primate (1974) Most Valuable Primate (1999) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books | |||
Periodicals |
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Theater & Movies | |||
Music |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit |  | [Baby monkey in containment unit] Oregon Regional Primate Research Center, Photography Department. Credit: National Library of Medicine. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| Play | Caption | Play | Caption |
 | Grunt; primate; . | | Roar; bellow; gorilla; anthropoid ape; simian; primate; barbarous; bloodthirsty; dangerous; enraged; feral; ferocious; fiery; furious; infuriated; primitive; raging; savage; untamed; vicious; violent; wild; enraged; maddened; provoked. |
| Gorilla; primate; anger; angry; huff; exhale; fierce; ferocious. | | Screaming; primate. |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Author | Date | Quotation |
Magna Carta | 1215 | Know that, having regard to God and for the salvation of our soul, and those of all our ancestors and heirs, and unto the honor of God and the advancement of his holy Church and for the rectifying of our realm, we have granted as underwritten by advice of our venerable fathers, Stephen, archbishop of Canterbury, primate of all England and cardinal of the holy Roman Church, Henry, archbishop of Dublin, William of London, Peter of Winchester, Jocelyn of Bath and Glastonbury, Hugh of Lincoln, Walter of Worcester, William of Coventry, Benedict of Rochester, bishops; of Master Pandulf, subdeacon and member of the household of our lord the Pope, of brother Aymeric (master of the Knights of the Temple in England), and of the illustrious men William Marshal, earl of Pembroke, William, earl of Salisbury, William, earl of Warenne, William, earl of Arundel, Alan of Galloway (constable of Scotland), Waren Fitz Gerold, Peter Fitz Herbert, Hubert De Burgh (seneschal of Poitou), Hugh de Neville, Matthew Fitz Herbert, Thomas Basset, Alan Basset, Philip d'Aubigny, Robert of Roppesley, John Marshal, John Fitz Hugh, and others, our liegemen. (reference) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | Ebola-Reston that appeared in a primate research facility in Virginia, may have been transmitted from monkey to monkey through the air in the facility. (references) | |
In 1989, a new Ebola virus subtype was identified in imported cynomolgous macaques (an Asiatic monkey, Macacca fascicularis) during an outbreak in a primate quarantine facility in the United States. (references) | ||
NINDS-supported scientists are currently working to develop both nonhuman primate and mouse models to investigate nerve degeneration in HD and to study the effects of excitotoxicity on nerve cells in the brain. (references) | ||
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Primate" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 98.31% of the time. "Primate" is used about 177 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 98.31% | 174 | 23,577 |
| Noun (proper) | 1.69% | 3 | 202,518 |
| Total | 100.00% | 177 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expression using "primate": Primate Diseases. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "primate": primate-like. | |
Ending with "primate": non-primate. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Language | Translations for "primate"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | primat (primates), kryepeshkop (archbishop). (various references) | |
Arabic | كبير الأساقفة, زعيم (bell wether, boss, captain, chief, cob, elder, head, leader, pacemaker, ruler), الحيوان الرئيسي. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | архиепископ (archbishop, metropolitan, provincial). (various references) | |
Chinese | 大主教 (Primates). (various references) | |
Czech | primas, primát (primacy), arcibiskup (archbishop). (various references) | |
Farsi | پیشوا (Headman, Leader, Rector, Van), کشیش ارشد (Prelate), راسته پستانداران نخستین پایه . (various references) | |
French | primate, primat, leader. (various references) | |
German | primat (primacy, primogeniture, priority), primas. (various references) | |
Greek | πρωτεύον θηλαστικό, αρχιεπίσκοποσ (archbishop), ανθρωποειδήσ πίθηκοσ. (various references) | |
Hebrew | פרימט. (various references) | |
Hungarian | prímás (egyházi), prímás, érsek (archbishop, hierarch, metropolitan). (various references) | |
Indonesian | uskup tertinggi. (various references) | |
Italian | primate, arcivescovo (archbishop). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 主教 (bishop, prelate). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | しゅきょう (bishop, merrymaking, prelate). (various references) | |
Korean | 대주교 (Primates). (various references) | |
Manx | far-ghooinney, ard-aspick (archbishop). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | imatepray.(various references) | |
Portuguese | primaz, arcebispo (archbishop, metropolitan). (various references) | |
Romanian | arhiepiscop (archbishop, metropolitan). (various references) | |
Russian | примат (apeman). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | primat (apeman), primas, sisar najvišeg reda, nadbiskup. (various references) | |
Spanish | primate, primar, primado. (various references) | |
Swedish | ärkebiskop (archbishop). (various references) | |
Turkish | başpiskopos (archbishop, pontiff). (various references) | |
Ukrainian | примат, примас (primacy). (various references) | |
Welsh | primas (chief). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | Primates. (various references) |
| Late Latin | 300-700 | primas. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "primate": primates, primateship, primateships. (additional references) | |
Words ending with "primate": subprimate. (additional references) | |
Words containing "primate": subprimates. (additional references) | |
| |
"Primate" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: opsimath, Paramatta, pimate, pirimide, pramate, premate, prematue, primae, primage, primat, primatu, primatve, primeate, primerate, primie, Primity, Prinotto, Proimager. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "primate" (pronounced prī"mā't) |
| 3 | -m ā' t | amalgamate, acclimate, automate, checkmate, classmate, decimate, dichromate, glutamate, inmate, overestimate, playmate, roommate, schoolmate, shipmate, stalemate, teammate, underestimate. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-e-i-m-p-r-t" | |
-1 letter: armpit, imaret, impart, permit, pirate, tamper. | |
-2 letters: aimer, apter, armet, atrip, irate, mater, merit, miter, mitre, pater, peart, pieta, prate, prima, prime, ramet, ramie, remap, remit, retia, tamer, taper, tapir, tempi, terai, timer, tramp, tripe. | |
-3 letters: airt, amie, amir, aper, emir, emit, item, mair, mare, mart, mate, meat, meta, mire, mite, pair, pare. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-e-i-m-p-r-t" | |
+1 letter: apterium, impacter, imparted, imparter, preadmit, primates, teraphim. | |
+2 letters: ametropia, ametropic, impacters, imparters, imperator, impetrate, implanter, imprecate, metacarpi, misparted, preadmits, preatomic, protamine, proximate, rebaptism, reimplant, septarium, spearmint, spermatia, spermatic, spermatid, tampering, trapezium. | |
+3 letters: ametropias, amphoteric, hemipteran, hermatypic, impairment, imparities, impartible, impartment, imperative, imperators, impetrated, impetrates, implanters, importable, importance, imprecated, imprecates, impregnant, impregnate, mastership, metaphoric, parametric, parimutuel, parliament, permeating, permeation, permeative, pigmentary, planimeter, portamenti, premarital, printmaker, protamines, psalterium, rebaptisms, reimplants, restamping, separatism, shipmaster, slipstream, spearmints, spermaceti, spermatial, spermatids, spermatium, subprimate, sympatries, trampoline, trapeziums, tryptamine. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Sounds | 9. Quotations: Historic 10. Quotations: Non-fiction 11. Usage Frequency 12. Expressions | 13. Expressions: Internet 14. Translations: Modern 15. Translations: Ancient 16. Derivations | 17. Rhymes 18. Anagrams 19. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
