phlegmatic means not easily excited to action or passion; calm; sluggish. It carries an Arena rating of 1783, earned across 9 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, phlegmatic ranks #571 of 13,275 for Most Betrayed by Its Sound, #735 of 13,275 for Most Elegant Words, #1,688 of 13,275 for Most Malleable Words, #3,220 of 13,275 for Words That Escaped Their Books.
phlegmatic is pronounced /flɛɡˈmætɪk/.
Why “phlegmatic” is a great word
Having an unemotional, calm, and sluggish temperament; not easily excited to action or passion. Its etymology is from Middle English fleumatik, from Old French fleumatique, from Latin phlegmaticus, from Ancient Greek φλεγματικός (phlegmatikós, 'pertaining to phlegm'), from φλέγμα (phlégma, 'phlegm, inflammation'), referring to the bodily humor which ancient medicine associated with a calm, cold, and indifferent disposition. Unlike 'apathetic', which implies a disengaged lack of interest, or 'stoic', which denotes a hard-won endurance through rational fortitude, phlegmatic suggests a constitutional, almost ponderous serenity. It is the steady hand that does not tremble in a crisis, the slow, deliberate blink of a large cat observing a world it sees no need to join, and the profound, unflappable silence of a deep lake at dawn—a stillness born not of emptiness but of an elemental inertia so profound that agitation seems physically impossible.
Etymology
From Middle English fleumatik, flewmatik, flematik, fleumatyke, flewmatyk, from Old French fleumatique, from Latin phlegmaticus, from Ancient Greek φλεγματικός (phlegmatikós), from φλέγμα (phlégma), referring to the humour which ancient Hippocratic and later Galenic medicine associated with mildness, coldness, sluggishness, and indifference. Spelling later altered to resemble the word's Latin and Greek roots, with modern pronunciation following this new spelling.
adj
- Not easily excited to action or passion; calm; sluggish.“Calm and phlegmatic, with a clear eye, Mr. Fogg seemed a perfect type of that English composure which Angelica Kauffmann has so skilfully represented on canvas.”
- Generating, causing, or full of phlegm.“cold and phlegmatic bodies”
noun
- One who has a phlegmatic disposition.
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