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Contents
secondary definition
Overview
This page has 25 definitions of secondary in English and Middle English. Secondary is an adjective and noun. Examples of how to use secondary in a sentence are shown. Also define these 0 related words and terms: .
English secondary definition
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| Cardinal: two Ordinal: second Latinate ordinal: secondary Adverbial: two times, twice Multiplier: twofold Latinate multiplier: double Distributive: doubly Collective: both, pair, twosome Greek or Latinate collective: dyad Greek collective prefix: di-, duo- Latinate collective prefix: bi- Multiuse collective: doublet, couple, couplet Fractional: half Greek prefix: deutero- Number of musicians: duo, duet, duplet | ||
Etymology
From Middle English secundarie, from Latin secundārius (“of the second class or quality”), from secundus (whence the English second) + -ārius (whence the English suffix -ary); compare the French secondaire, the Italian secondario, the Occitan secundari, the Portuguese secundario, and the Spanish secundario.
Pronunciation
Adjective
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| Next: | tertiary |
secondary (not generally comparable, comparative more secondary, superlative most secondary)
- Next in order to the first or primary; of second place in origin, rank, etc.
- Originating from a deputy or delegated person or body
- the work of secondary hands
- (organic chemistry) Derived from a parent compound by replacement of two atoms of hydrogen by organic radicals
- (geology) Produced by alteration or deposition subsequent to the formation of the original rock mass.
- (geology) Developed by pressure or other causes.
- secondary cleavage
- (anatomy) Pertaining to the second joint of the wing of a bird.
- (medicine) Dependent or consequent upon another disease, or occurring in the second stage of a disease.
- Bright's disease is often secondary to scarlet fever.
- the secondary symptoms of syphilis
- Of less than primary importance.
- a secondary issue
- 1992, Deborah Bernstein, Pioneers and Homemakers: Jewish Women in Pre-state Israel, page 227:
- the problem of sexual equality became even more secondary than before in the eyes of the kibbutz and of its women members.
- (education) Related to secondary education, i.e. schooling between the ages of (approximately) 11 and 18.
- (manufacturing) Relating to the manufacture of goods from raw materials.
- (of a color) Formed by mixing primary colors.
- Yellow is a secondary light color, though a primary CMYK color.
- (taxonomy, not comparable) Representing a reversion to an ancestral state.
- 2016 May 27, Wayne M. Matthis; Luciane Marinoni, “Revision of Ephydrini Zetterstedt (Diptera: Ephydridae) from the Americas south of the United States”, in Zootaxa, volume 4116, number 1, DOI::
- With the exception of a secondary loss in Dimecoenia, larvae of Ephydrini have prominent, ventral prolegs that bear crochets.
Coordinate terms
Terms coordinate to secondary
Derived terms
Terms derived from secondary (adjective)
- secondarily
- secondary alcohol
- secondary amine
- secondary cell wall
- secondary color, secondary colour
- secondary drowning
- secondary education
- secondary emission
- secondary energy
- secondary fermentation
- secondary hypothermia
- secondary immunodeficiency
- secondary industry
- secondary infection
- secondary intention
- secondary ion mass spectrometry
- secondary liability
- secondary market
- secondary phosphine
- secondary radar
- secondary research
- secondary school
- secondary sector
- secondary sex characteristic
- secondary smoking
- secondary source
- secondary structure
- secondary surveillance radar
- secondary valence
- secondary victimisation, secondary victimization
- secondary work
- secondary world
Translations
succeeding first
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acting by deputation
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Noun
secondary (plural secondaries)
- (ornithology) Any flight feather attached to the ulna (forearm) of a bird.
- (aviation) A radar return generated by the response of an aircraft's transponder to an interrogation signal broadcast by a radar installation, containing additional encoded identification and situational data not available from a simple primary return.
- (military) The second stage of a multistage thermonuclear weapon, which generates a fusion explosion when imploded as an indirect result of the fission explosion of the primary; in a few extremely large weapons, the secondary may itself implode a fusion tertiary.
- (finance) An act of issuing more stock by an already publicly traded corporation.
- (American football, Canadian football) The defensive backs.
- (electronics) An inductive coil or loop that is magnetically powered by a primary in a transformer or similar.
- One who occupies a subordinate or auxiliary place; a delegate deputy.
- the secondary, or undersheriff, of the city of London
- c. 1603–1604, William Shakespeare, “Measvre for Measure”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act I, scene i]:
- Old Escalus […] is thy secondary.
- (astronomy) A secondary circle.
- (astronomy) A satellite.
- (education) A secondary school.
- There are four secondaries in this district, each with several thousand pupils.
- Anything secondary or of lesser importance.
Translations
flight feather attached to the ulna
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Middle English secondary definition
Adjective
secondary
- Alternative form of secundarie
Noun
secondary
- Alternative form of secundarie