quiddity

Definitions  ·  Examples  ·  Pronunciations  ·  Etymologies  ·  Related  ·  Statistics  ·  Comments (4)  · 
A novelist's ultimate achievement is to enable us to know a character so well that we catch a glimpse of his inviolable unknowability, his singular quiddity -- in other words, though Wood doesn't use the term, his soul.

View all »
Definitions (7)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. noun The real nature of a thing; the essence.
  2. noun A hairsplitting distinction; a quibble.

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (2)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (1)

Toggle WordNet definitions WordNet (2)

Toggle elsewhere links Elsewhere on the web

View all »
Examples (50)

  • A novelist's ultimate achievement is to enable us to know a character so well that we catch a glimpse of his inviolable unknowability, his singular quiddity -- in other words, though Wood doesn't use the term, his soul. —  Powell's Books: Overview
  • "Psha! he has not put that in at all As a matter of entity and quiddity, it is well-nigh impossible to put into a letter the little quivering lift of spirit that may come to a man just because a girl's hair is lustrous, her eyes winey, her voice delicious, her smile one of gay fellowship FOOTNOTE 1] Carington could not Chapter Five BOOM TIME IN THE TOWN THAT JACK BUILT Here we are! —  Sally of Missouri
  • But we are now speaking of nature as it signifies the essence, or the "what-it-is," or the quiddity of the species Now, if we take nature in this way, it is impossible that the union of the Incarnate Word took place in the nature. —  Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) From the Complete American Edition
  • Consequently, the definition of substance is not--"a being of itself without a subject," nor is the definition of accident--"a being in a subject"; but it belongs to the quiddity or essence of substance "to have existence not in a subject"; while it belongs to the quiddity or essence of accident "to have existence in a subject." —  Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) From the Complete American Edition
  • Therefore God's existence is not the same as His essence--that is, as His quiddity or nature On the contrary, Hilary says (Trin. —  Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) From the Complete American Edition
 

Tags

Sign up or sign in to add tags.

Stats

This word has been looked up 310 times.

3 people have marked this word as a favorite.

On Twitter

Photos from

flickr images

Etymologies (2)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Medieval Latin quidditās, from Latin quid, what; see kwo- in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. = French quiddité, from Middle Latin quiddita(t-)s, ‘whatness,’ from Latin quid, what (= English what): see quid.
 

Pronunciations
Record your own »

/ˈkwɪdəti/
by American Heritage

Charts

frequency chart

Bubble size: how much this word was used in a year

Bubble height: used more or less than expected, vs. all uses evenly distributed

We are still working on calculating this word's frequency.

Recently looked up

beatdown · purl · slatternly · Exubera · evol

Recent Favorites

pygopagus · sanglant · Astacus · sweetbread · qualms

Recent Pronunciations

Kansas City · spell it rite · put it in your pocket · A fly and a flea flew into a flue · She sells seashells by the seashore