Temporals

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Relating to time or the passage of time, especially in contrast to eternal or spiritual aspects
2. Describing elements that pertain to worldly affairs or the material world rather than the abstract
3. Indicating a designation or order that is bound by time, often used in various contexts such as music or linguistics

Etymology: "Temporals" is simply the plural of "temporal", and the adjective's history is tangled in a way that surprises most readers. The Latin "tempus" meant "time", but the Late Latin "tempora" meant "the temples of the head", the flat areas at the sides of the skull. Those two Latin words produced two English words that now sit far apart in meaning, the "temporal" of time and the "temporal" of anatomy, and the two are doublets sharing a root. The anatomical sense is why "temporal bone" and "temporalis muscle" exist today. The time sense has a longer and more morally loaded history. Medieval English used "temporal" to mean "transitory, worldly, material", set against the eternal and spiritual, so a "temporal" lord was one who governed secular affairs rather than church matters. Old French "temporel" carried the same contrast, and the sense of "relating to time" as opposed to eternity is what Latin "temporālis" already held.

Synonyms: time-related, secular, worldly