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Arctic. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
Arctic, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
Arctic in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
Arctic you have here. The definition of the word
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English
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Middle French artique (with -c- reintroduced after Latin in the 17th century), from Latin arcticus, from Ancient Greek ἀρκτικός (arktikós, “northern, of the (Great) Bear”), from ἄρκτος (árktos, “bear, Ursa Major”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂ŕ̥tḱos (“bear”). Cognate to Latin ursus.
Pronunciation
Adjective
Arctic (not comparable)
- (astronomy, now only in compounds) Pertaining to the celestial north pole, or to the pole star.
- (geography) Pertaining to the northern polar region of the planet, characterised by extreme cold and an icy landscape.
1667, John Milton, “Book II”, in Paradise Lost. , London: [Samuel Simmons], , →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: , London: Basil Montagu Pickering , 1873, →OCLC, lines 706-711:[…] on th’ other side
Incenc’t with indignation Satan stood
Unterrifi’d, and like a Comet burn’d,
That fires the length of Ophiucus huge
In th’ Artick Sky, and from his horrid hair
Shakes Pestilence and Warr.
1788, Samuel Jackson Pratt, Humanity, or the Rights of Nature, London: T. Cadell, Book 2, p. 96:See FREEDOM smiling thro’ the realms of frost,
And glow on Labradore’s inclement coast,
Tho’ darkness sheds deep night thro’ half the year,
And snow invests the clime,—that clime is dear,
For there fair LIBERTY resides, and there
At large the native breasts the searching air,
Where blows the arctic tempests icy gale,
And famine seizes on the spermy whale,
- Extremely cold, snowy, or having other properties of extreme winter associated with the Arctic.
1979, John Le Carré, Smiley's People, Folio Society, published 2010, page 45:‘Could you close that window, please!’ Strickland called, dialling again. ‘It's bloody arctic down this end.’
- Designed for use in very cold conditions.
Usage notes
- Like Antarctic, the English word was originally pronounced without /k/, but the spelling pronunciation has become the more common one. The "c" was originally added to the spelling for etymological reasons, and its pronunciation followed thereafter.
Translations
pertaining to the northern polar region of the planet
cold, snowy, or having other properties of extreme winter associated with the Arctic
Proper noun
Arctic
- (obsolete) The north celestial pole.
- (geography) The region of the Earth above the Arctic Circle, containing the North Pole.
1772, Richard Cumberland, The Fashionable Lover, London: W. Griffin, act IV, page 46:I’ve visited the world from arctic to ecliptic, as a surgeon does a hospital, and find all men sick of some distemper […]
Derived terms
Translations
a region of the Earth
- Afrikaans: Arktika
- Albanian: Arktik
- Arabic: أَرْكِتِيك (ʔarkitīk), القُطْب الشَمَالِيّ m (al-quṭb aš-šamāliyy)
- Armenian: Արկտիկա (hy) (Arktika)
- Azerbaijani: Arktika (az)
- Belarusian: А́рктыка f (Árktyka)
- Bengali: সুমেরু অঞ্চল (śumeru oncol)
- Bulgarian: А́рктика (bg) f (Árktika)
- Burmese: အာတိတ် (my) (atit)
- Catalan: Àrtida f, Àrtic m
- Chinese:
- Mandarin: 北極/北极 (zh) (běijí)
- Chukchi: Эйгысӄын (Ėjgysqyn)
- Czech: Arktida (cs) f
- Danish: Arktis
- Esperanto: Arkto
- Estonian: Arktika (et)
- Finnish: arktinen alue
- French: Arctique (fr) f
- Georgian: არქტიკა (arkṭiḳa)
- German: Arktis (de) f
- Greek: Αρκτική (el) f (Arktikí)
- Greenlandic: Issittoq
- Hebrew: האזור הארקטי
- Hindi: आर्कटिक (ārkaṭik)
- Hungarian: Arktisz (hu)
- Icelandic: Norðurslóðir f pl, Norðurskautssvæðið n, Norðurheimskautssvæðið n
- Ido: arktiko (io)
- Indonesian: Arktik
- Irish: Artach m
- Italian: Artide m
- Japanese: 北極 (ja) (ほっきょく, hokkyoku)
- Kazakh: Арктика (Arktika)
- Khmer: អាកទិក (ʼaaktɨk)
- Korean: 북극(北極) (ko) (bukgeuk)
- Kyrgyz: Арктика (Arktika)
- Lao: ແຖບຂົ້ວໂລກເຫນືອ (thǣp khūa lōk nư̄a), ອາກຕິກ (ʼāk tik)
- Latvian: Arktika f
- Lithuanian: Arktis (lt) m
- Macedonian: А́рктик m (Árktik)
- Malay: Artik (ms)
- Manx: Yn Arctagh m
- Mongolian: хойд туйл (xojd tujl), Арктик (Arktik)
- Norwegian:
- Bokmål: Arktis
- Nynorsk: Arktis
- Persian: شمالگان (fa) (šomâlegân)
- Polish: Arktyka (pl) f
- Portuguese: ártico (pt) m
- Romanian: Arctica f
- Russian: А́рктика (ru) f (Árktika)
- Serbo-Croatian:
- Cyrillic: Арктик m
- Roman: Arktik (sh) m
- Slovak: Arktída f
- Slovene: Arktika (sl) f
- Spanish: ártico (es) m, árctico (es) (obsolete)
- Swahili: Aktiki
- Swedish: Arktis (sv) n
- Tagalog: Artiko
- Tajik: Арктика (Arktika)
- Thai: อาร์กติก (áak-dtìk)
- Tigrinya: ኣርክቲክ (ʾarkətik)
- Tongan: ʻĀketika
- Turkish: Arktika (tr), Kuzey Kutbu (tr)
- Turkmen: Arktika (tk)
- Ukrainian: А́рктика f (Árktyka)
- Uzbek: Arktika
- Vietnamese: vùng Bắc Cực, phương bắc
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Noun
Arctic (plural Arctics)
- (US, now chiefly historical) A warm waterproof overshoe.
- Any of various butterflies of the genus Oeneis.
Anagrams