Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Transitory |
TransitoryAdjective1. Enduring a very short time; "the ephemeral joys of childhood"; "a passing fancy"; "youth's transient beauty"; "love is transitory but at is eternal"; "fugacious blossoms". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "transitory" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1350. (references) |
Etymology: Transitory \Tran"si*to*ry\, adjective. [Latin expression transitorius: compare to the French expression transitoire. See Transient.]. (Websters 1913) |
Synonyms: TransitorySynonyms: ephemeral (adj), fugacious (adj), passing (adj), short-lived (adj), transient (adj). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Transientness | Phrase: one's days are numbered; the time is up; here today and gone tomorrow; non semper erit aestas; eheu! fugaces labuntur anni; sic transit gloria mundi; a schoolboy's tale, the wonder of the hour!; dum loquimur fugerit invidia aetas; fugit hora; all that is transitory is but an illusion. |
Adjective: transient, transitory, transitive; passing, evanescent, fleeting, cursory, short-lived, ephemeral; flying; Verb: fugacious, fugitive; shifting, slippery; spasmodic; instantaneous, momentaneous. | |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Transitory |
| English words defined with "transitory": Caduke ♦ ephemera, ephemeral ♦ focal seizure, fugacious ♦ Local actions ♦ Milk fever ♦ passing, Pick's disease ♦ short-lived, Slatch ♦ Temporal augment, transient ♦ Zoogloea. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "transitory": Amaurosis Fugax, amaurosis partialis fugax ♦ besmettelijke bloedarmoede ♦ equine infectious anaemia ♦ gust vector ♦ horse malaria ♦ infectieuze anemie ♦ partial fugacious amaurosis, pernicious equine anaemia ♦ WIND. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | And we're going to have this transitory cow fling thing right here in Cicely? (Northern Exposure; writing credit: Khadijah Hashim) For a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent. (New York: A Documentary Film; writing credit: Ric Burns; James Sanders) | |
Movie/TV Titles | Transitory States (1989) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
Books |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Author | Quotation |
Carlyle | Foolish men mistake transitory semblances for eternal fact, and go astray more and more. |
Charles Caleb Colton | Commerce flourishes by circumstances, precarious, transitory, contingent, almost as the winds and waves that bring it to our shores. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Scarlet Letter | Hawthorne, Nathaniel | But I never considered it as other than a transitory life. |
Walden | Thoreau, Henry David | His goodness must not be a partial and transitory act, but a constant superfluity, which costs him nothing and of which he is unconscious. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | Side effects are generally transitory, well tolerated, and amenable to treatment. (references) | |
Transitory fecal incontinence has been recorded in 2 of 15 patients treated for anismus. (references) | ||
This is due to both the transitory nature of the disease and the lack of a specific diagnostic testspecific symptoms and changes in the brain must develop before the diagnosis is confirmed. (references) | ||
Business | From January 1, 1999 to January 1, 2002, the Euro will be going through a transitory phase during which only financial transactions that do not require the physical use of bills and coins -- mainly bank operations -- will begin to be done in Euros. (references) | |
Civil Liberties | Italy | However, Parliament has not yet repealed the XIII transitory provision of the 1947 Constitution, which forbids male heirs of the former king, Umberto I of Savoy, from entering the country. (references) |
Economic History | Romania | Legislation providing for transitory ("pipeline") patent protection was enacted in early 1998. (references) |
Philippines | Marcos governed from 1973 until mid-1981 in accordance with the transitory provisions of a new constitution that replaced the commonwealth constitution of 1935. He suppressed democratic institutions and restricted civil liberties during the martial law period, ruling largely by decree and popular referenda. (references) | |
Human Rights | Peru | At the same time, the Government created transitory councils. (references) |
Women | Argentina | Public and private institutions offer prevention programs and provide support and treatment for women who have been abused, but transitory housing is almost nonexistent. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| Speaker | Term | Phrase(s) |
James Madison | 1809-1817 | Whether this was the transitory effect of capricious despotism or the first act of predetermined hostility is not ascertained. |
John Quincy Adams | 1825-1829 | The collisions of party spirit which originate in speculative opinions or in different views of administrative policy are in their nature transitory. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| "Transitory" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 100.00% of the time. "Transitory" is used about 133 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 |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 100% | 133 | 27,614 |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "transitory": all that is transitory is but an illusion ♦ Chose transitory ♦ Transitory action ♦ transitory provision. Additional references. | |
| 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. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
transitory | 9 |
amnesia global transitory | 2 |
benign chest pain transitory wall | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "transitory"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Albanian | kalimtar (ephemeral, evanescent, goer, momentary, passerby, passing, pedestrian, temporal, temporary, transitional, transitive, unabiding), jo i gjatë, jetëshkurtër (ephemeral, passing, short lived), i shkurtër (brief, curt, fleeting, little, momentary, near, recapitulatory, scrubby, short, stubby, terse), i përkohshëm (acting, impermanent, interim, interjacent, pro tem, temporal, temporary, transient, transitional). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Arabic | مؤقت (interim, jury, provisional, provisory, temporal, temporary, tentative, transition), سريع الزوال (ephemeral, evanescent, flighty, fragile, fugacious, transient, volatile), زائل (evanescent, impermanent, temporal, transient), عابر (ephemeral, fleeting, in transit, parlous, passing, precarious, sneak, stealthy, tenuous, transient). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bulgarian | кратък (brief, compact, concise, curt, horary, little, near, short, swift, transient), краткотраен (deciduous, ephemeral, fleeting, fugacious, momentary, perishable, rapid, short, unabiding), моментен (momentary), преходен (caducous, deciduous, fleeting, fugitive, in between, intermediate, passing, temporal, temporary, transient, transit, transition, transitional, transitive, unabiding). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Chinese | 瞬间 (instantaneous, mo). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Czech | pomíjející (ephemeral, perishable), přechodný (fugacious, intermediate, momentary, passing, temporary, transient, transitional, transitive), doèasný (provisional, temporal, temporary), chvilkový (momentary). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Danish | transitorisk. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dutch | transitoir, transitoor. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Farsi | فانی (Earthborn, Memnetary, Mortal, Transient), ناپایدار (Changeable, Impermanent, Ramshackle, Transient), سپنج (Temporary), زودگذر (Ephemeral, Fleet, Frail, Glancing, Glint, Light, Memnetary, Perishable, Shadowy, Temporary, Transient), بی بقا. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Finnish | ohimenevä (passing, transient), ohimatka (passing, transient), lyhytaikainen (of short duration, short-term), katoavainen (perishable), katoava (perishable), hetkellinen (momentary, temporary), häipyvä (fugitive). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
French | transitoire (transient). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
German | transitorisch. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Greek | παροδικόσ (evanescent, impermanent, transient). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hebrew | חולף (ephemeral, evanescent, fleeting, fugitive, passing, transient), כל" (betrothed, bride, daughter in law, ephemeral, temporal). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hungarian | mulandó (caducous, evanescent, fleeting, fragile, perishable, transient, unhelpful). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Indonesian | fana (fleeting, fugacious, mortal). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Italian | transitorio (fleeting, meteoric, momentary, temporary, transient). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Kanji | 刹那的 (ephemeral). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Katakana | せつなてき (ephemeral). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Korean | 덧없은. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Manx | neuveayn (ephemeral, fluid, impermanent, non-durable, passing, short-lived, temporary, transient). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pig Latin | ansitorytray transitório (brief, deciduous, ephemeral, fleeting, frail, fugacious, makeshift, momentary, passing, perishable, perishing, temporary, transient, transitional), transitório, temporário (interim, makeshift, provisional, temporary), provisório (interim, provisional, provisory, temporary), passageiro (ephemeral, faddy, fare, fleet, momentary, passing, perfunctory, rider, temporary, transient, transitional, wayfarer), momentâneo (instantaneous, momentary, transient), efêmero (deciduous, drake, ephemeral, fleeting, frail, fugacious, momentary, perishable, perishing, transient). (various references) trecãtor (bystander, evanescent, foot passenger, fugacious, fungous, goer, momentary, passer, passer by, passing, pedestrian, temporary, transient), tranzitoriu (transient), vremelnic (ephemeral, fleeting, temporal, temporarily, temporary, transient), cãlãtor (excursionist, fare, fleeting, goer, itinerant, passenger, peregrine, peripatetic, pilgrim, rider, roaming, short lived, tourist, traveller, travelling, vagrant, visitor, voyager, wayfarer, wayfaring man). (various references) переходящий (temporary, transited, transitional). (various references) prolazan (brief, caducous, evanescent, fleeting, fly-by-night, fugacious, momentary, negotiable, passable, passing, perishable, pervious, temporary, transient), privremen (provisional, temporal, temporary), nepostojan (changeable, evanescent, fugacious, impermanent, inconstant, labile, transient, unabiding, vacillating). (various references) transitorio (remand, temporary, transient). (various references) övergående (fly-by-night, passing, transient). (various references) süreksiz (impermanent, transient), geçici (ad interim, Band aid, casual, curable, deciduous, ephemeral, extrinsic, fading, flying, fortuitous, fugacious, impermanent, interim, interlocutory, jury, makeshift, momentary, palliative, passing, pro forma, provisional, provisory, provo, stopgap, temporal, temporary, tentative, transient, volatile), fani (earth-born, earthling, ephemeral, evanescent, fading, fleet, fleeting, transient), eğreti (artificial, Band aid, extrinsic, improvised, jury, makeshift, rough, stopgap, temporary). (various references) gцзme (mobile). (various references) минущий (avoidable), ефемерний (aerial, aeriform, ephemeral). (various references) tạm thời (deciduous, momentary, momently, precarious, provisional, temporary), nhất thời (impermanent, momentary, momently, precarious, temporary, transient, unabiding). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | fragilis, temporalis-e, volatilis. (various references) |
| Late Latin | 300-700 | transitorius. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Misspellings | |
"Transitory" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: tanistry, tansitory, transistory, transitorly, transitors, Transitray. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "transitory" (pronounced tra"nzutô'rē) |
| 6 | -z u t ô' r ē | accusatory, depository, repository. |
| 5 | -u t ô' r ē | aleatory, ambulatory, anticipatory, articulatory, auditory, celebratory, circulatory, compensatory, conciliatory, confirmatory, confiscatory, congratulatory, contributory, declaratory, defamatory, depilatory, derogatory, dilatory, discriminatory, dormitory, excretory, exculpatory, expiratory, explanatory, exploratory, hallucinatory, incantatory, inflammatory, inhibitory, interrogatory, investigatory, laboratory, laudatory, lavatory, mandatory, migratory, nondiscriminatory, obligatory, observatory, oratory, oscillatory, participatory, predatory, preparatory, prohibitory, purgatory, reformatory, regulatory, respiratory, retaliatory, revelatory, signatory, statutory, territory. |
| 4 | -t ô' r ē | desultory, multistory, repertory, understory. |
| 3 | -ô' r ē | allegory, category, outlawry, promissory. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-i-n-o-r-r-s-t-t-y" | |
-1 letter: antistory, nitrators. | |
-2 letters: artistry, nitrator, strontia, tanistry, traitors. | |
-3 letters: aroints, aroynts, attorns, intorts, ostiary, rations, rattons, station, traitor, transit, trinary, tritons, tyrants, yttrias. | |
-4 letters: aorist, aristo, aroint, aroynt, arsino, artist, astony, attorn, instar, intort, intros, nitros, norias, notary, ottars, rarity, ration, ratios, ratton, rayons, rosary, rosiny, rostra, rotary, sanity, santir, sartor, satiny, satori, snotty. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-i-n-o-r-r-s-t-t-y" | |
+2 letters: transitorily. | |
+4 letters: martyrizations, transmigratory. | |
+5 letters: dorsiventrality, dorsoventrality, remonstratively. | |
| 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. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)54 72 61 6E 73 69 74 6F 72 79 |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references)- .-. .- -. ... .. - --- .-. -.--. |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01010100 01110010 01100001 01101110 01110011 01101001 01110100 01101111 01110010 01111001 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)T r a n s i t o r y |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)0054 0072 0061 006E 0073 0069 0074 006F 0072 0079 |
| British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)
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Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)54846780857586818491 |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Quotations: Familiar 7. Quotations: Fiction 8. Quotations: Non-fiction | 9. Quotations: Speeches 10. Usage Frequency 11. Expressions 12. Expressions: Internet | 13. Translations: Modern 14. Translations: Ancient 15. Derivations 16. Rhymes | 17. Anagrams 18. Orthography 19. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
