spontaneous

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English

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Late Latin spontāneus.

Pronunciation

Adjective

spontaneous (comparative more spontaneous, superlative most spontaneous)

  1. Self-generated; happening without any apparent external cause.
    Synonym: autonomous
    He made a spontaneous offer of help.
    a make spontaneous decision
  2. Done by one's own free choice, or without planning.
    Synonym: autonomous
  3. Proceeding from natural feeling or native tendency without external or conscious constraint.
    Synonym: autonomous
  4. Arising from a momentary impulse.
  5. Controlled and directed internally; self-active; spontaneous movement characteristic of living things.
  6. Produced without being planted or without human cultivation or labor.
    • 1751, [Tobias] Smollett, chapter 106, in The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle , volume IV, London: Harrison and Co., , →OCLC:
      H]e persisted in his design; and, because he would not make his wants known, actually subsisted for several days on hips, haws and sloes, and other spontaneous fruits which he gathered in the woods and fields.
  7. Sudden, without warning.
    Synonyms: abrupt, precipitous, subitaneous; see also Thesaurus:sudden

Derived terms

Translations

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