Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Of or relating to phlegm; phlegmy.
- adj. Having or suggesting a calm, sluggish temperament; unemotional.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Of the nature of phlegm; watery; aqueous: as, phlegmatic humors.
- Generating or causing phlegm.
- Abounding in phlegm; lymphatic; hence, cold; dull; sluggish; heavy; not easily excited to action or passion; apathetic; cool and self-restrained: as, a phlegmatic temperament. See temperament.
- Synonyms Frigid, impassive, unsusceptible. See apathy.
Wiktionary
- adj. Not easily excited to action or passion; calm; sluggish.
- adj. archaic Abounding in phlegm; as, phlegmatic humors; a phlegmatic constitution.
- adj. Generating, causing, or full of phlegm.
- adj. Watery.
- n. One who has a phlegmatic disposition.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. obsolete Watery.
- adj. Abounding in phlegm
- adj. Generating or causing phlegm.
- adj. Not easily excited to action or passion; cold; dull; sluggish; heavy.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. showing little emotion
Etymologies
- From Ancient Greek φλέγμα (phlégma, "phlegma") (Wiktionary)
- Middle English fleumatik, from Old French fleumatique, from Late Latin phlegmaticus, full of phlegm, from Greek phlegmatikos, from phlegma, phlegmat-, heat, the humor phlegm, from phlegein, to burn; see bhel-1 in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“He recalled the phlegmatic doctor, he recalled how he had grinned, that is, wrinkled up his nose when he saw him coming out of the wood almost arm-inarm with Baron Dönhof.”
“His temperament exhibited all the varieties known to science: in the morning, before drinking, he was melancholy; in the middle of the day, choleric; and in the evening, phlegmatic, that is to say, he did nothing at that time but snore and grunt till he was put to bed.”
“English, in our passion for daily excitement, might call her phlegmatic, but we should call her so unjustly.”
“One of the psychologists in Solar Defence had termed Hunter phlegmatic, which is to say lazy and sluggish.”
Secret Mission Moluk
“He recalled the phlegmatic doctor, he recalled how he had grinned, that is, wrinkled up his nose when he saw him coming out of the wood almost arm-in-arm with Baron Dönhof.”
“If we cast a glance at the variety to be observed in the human character in respect to feeling, we find, first, some people who have very little excitability, who are called phlegmatic or indolent.”
“Phlegmatic: The phlegmatic is the hardest to pinpoint because she's the queen of blending in.”
“The present Pakistani government is holding on by its fingernails and its response to the earthquake will probably be phlegmatic, which is, unfortunately, probably as much as it can manage.”
“Medical and popular opinion accused plants that grew underground of causing "phlegmatic" diseases, which ran the gamut from leprosy to hemorrhoids.”
“As an aside, "phlegmatic" was often used in 19th century discourse as a nice way to say "lazy.”
"Beyond dirty campaigning... to something truly dishonorable."
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘phlegmatic’.
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1100
abound, technology, branch of knowled..., prognosticate, automaton, matron, an older married ..., realm, special field of ..., kingdom, annals, historical records and 981 more...
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GRE 2014
abase, abate, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abjure, abortive, abound, abrasive, abreast, abridge and 1577 more...
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GRE Barron's 800
abate, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abject, abjure, abscission, abscond, abstemious, abstinence, abysmal, accretion and 787 more...
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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phrontistery - p
from phrontistery.info
pustule, purulence, pushful, purser, purpureal, putative, purpure, purpresture, purloin, purline, purlieu, purlicue and 1766 more...
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From reading
Collected from reading
venerate, reprobate, reticent, adoration, ethereal, ephemeral, equivocal, contumacious, heinous, solicitous, agnostic, aberration and 335 more...
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EN - pronunciation fun
All words of the poem
The Chaos
by Gerard Nolst Trenité
Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse <...abyss, ache, actual, advice, aerie, age, ague, aisles, alas, alien, alive, allowed and 406 more...
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P
letters starting with p
predicament, presumptuous, predilection, plausible, preeminent, plaintive, paragon, partisan, pathological, paucity, pedantic, penchant and 28 more...
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man gre
abase, abeyance, abreast, abscission, abscond, abyss, accede, accretion, acerbic, acidulous, acumen, adulterate and 483 more...
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GRE 1100
drudgery, implore, hapless, nuance, wrest, incipient, inadvertent, tremulous, bristle, euphemism, disdain, pugnacious and 346 more...
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To Be or Not To Be
Words to live by (or not)
prescient, polyglot, fatuous, phlegmatic, mendacious, pithy, ebullient, epicure, perspicacious, philistine, probity, profligate and 9 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1827 more...
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to memorize
words i need to memorize
aberrant, abscond, advocate, aggrandize, amalgamate, ambiguous, ambrosial, anomalous, antediluvian, antipathy, arbitrate, assuage and 163 more...
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1100 words you need to know
GRE words
voracious, indiscriminate, replete, steeped, eminent, perceive, intrepid, compound, automaton, reticent, interminable, drudgery and 288 more...
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Carlos' Words
monstropolous, absquatulate
pinguid, triffid, calque, refulgent, monstropolous, Seanchaí, clinquant, Chryselephantine ..., peavey, milium, swage, Burtillon, Burtil... and 215 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for phlegmatic.
tchaymore I never really thought of "sluggish" as a synonym or part of the definition for phlegmatic. Maybe because, for whatever reason, phlegmatic has a positive association for me. I tend to think of Ron Swanson when I hear "phlegmatic." Mar 6, 2012
kingparton Superficially he's a phlegmatic type, slouching round in old clothes, staring vacantly at the stars or at nothing at all, sitting in the center of a circle of students and scratching his head and grinning.
Oscar James Campbell, Patterns for Living Dec 14, 2011
jorge999 not stick shift
not automatic
my transmission
is phlegmatic Nov 7, 2009
mkb One of the four humors.
May 8, 2008
reesetee Ohhhhh. I get it. Heehee. Oct 18, 2007
chained_bear It's how I make stupid jokes, and then make clear that it's a stupid joke. Ahuh! Huhhuh!
(see? You probably didn't know that was a laugh, did you? Yet I spelled it phonetically. What's a poor chained_bear to do?) Oct 17, 2007
reesetee Why the sudden penchant for weak upper-class-twit laugh? :-) Oct 17, 2007
chained_bear I used this word in a conversation today. Yay me! (It was in reference to a colleague from England. Ahuh! Huhhuh! < -- weak upper-class-twit laugh.) Oct 17, 2007