Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Third in place, order, degree, or rank.
  • adjective Of, relating to, or designating the short flight feathers nearest the body on the rear edge of a bird's wing.
  • adjective Of, relating to, or having a carbon atom that is attached to three other carbon atoms in a molecule.
  • adjective Of or relating to the replacement of three of several atoms or groups in a compound, such as an amine in which three valences of the functional group are taken by carbon atoms.
  • adjective Of or relating to salts of acids containing three replaceable hydrogen atoms.
  • adjective Of, relating to, or being the period of geologic time from about 65 to about 1.8 million years ago, the older of the two periods of the Cenozoic Era. The Tertiary Period is characterized by the appearance of modern flora, insects, fish, amphibians, and reptiles, and by the dominance of mammals as vertebrate life forms on land.
  • noun A tertiary feather.
  • noun The Tertiary Period.
  • noun Roman Catholic Church A member of a religious Third Order.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Of the third order, rank, or formation; third.
  • In geology, of, pertaining to, or occurring in the Tertiary. See II. .
  • In ornithology, same as tertial: distinguished from secondary and from primary. See cuts under bird and covert, n., 6.
  • Belonging or pertaining To the Tertiaries. See II. .
  • noun One who or that which is tertiary, or third in order or succession.
  • noun A color, as russet, citrine, or olive, produced by the mixture of two secondary colors. Tertiaries are grays, and are either red-gray, blue-gray, or yellow-gray when these primaries are in excess, or violet-gray, orange-gray, or green-gray when these secondaries are in excess.
  • noun Same as tertial.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (R. C. Ch.) A member of the Third Order in any monastic system. See Third Order, under third.
  • noun (Geol.) The Tertiary era, period, or formation.
  • noun (Zoöl.) One of the quill feathers which are borne upon the basal joint of the wing of a bird. See Illust. of Bird.
  • adjective Being of the third formation, order, or rank; third.
  • adjective (Chem.) Possessing some quality in the third degree; having been subjected to the substitution of three atoms or radicals. Cf. Primary, and Secondary.
  • adjective (Geol.) Later than, or subsequent to, the Secondary.
  • adjective (Zoöl.) Growing on the innermost joint of a bird's wing; tertial; -- said of quills.
  • adjective (Geol.) See under Age, 8.
  • adjective a color produced by the mixture of two secondaries.
  • adjective (Geol.) The rock formation of that period; -- called also Tertiary formation. See the Chart of Geology.
  • adjective (Med.) the third and last stage of syphilis, in which it invades the bones and internal organs.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Of third rank or order; subsequent.
  • noun A tertiary feather.
  • noun A member of a Roman Catholic third order - the Franciscans, Dominicans and Carmelites among others.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun from 63 million to 2 million years ago
  • adjective coming next after the second and just before the fourth in position

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin tertiārius, from tertius, third; see trei- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From the Latin tertiārius ("of the third part or rank"), from tertius ("third") + -ārius (whence the English suffix -ary); compare the French tertiaire.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word tertiary.

Examples

  • It would be better for government to focus on its core competency (safety regulation) and let the other fall by the wayside, but at least separating the primary from the tertiary is a good first step.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » The Self-Pity of Elena Kagan 2010

  • "That's what they call tertiary recovery," Clark said.

    Hillary Clinton, Wes Clark and Christie Vilsack Talk About 'Tertiary Recovery' at Breakfast 2007

  • Out of the 50 direct cases, 6 deaths were related to abortion as follows: 1 septic abortion, 2 ectopic pregnancies, and 3 indirect deaths after having completed the induced abortion. 5 out of these 6 cases were handled in tertiary care centers.

    ProWomanProLife » When abortion endangers your health 2009

  • Academic Capacity - measured by the graduates 'performance in tertiary education.

    Transparency 2010

  • "The lower tertiary is recognized as a huge resource with the potential for long life projects of up to 30 to 40 years," said Chevron Vice Chairman George Kirkland in prepared remarks.

    Chevron to Invest in Gulf Oil Fields Isabel Ordonez 2010

  • Academic Capacity - measured by the graduates 'performance in tertiary education.

    What's the Goal?? 2008

  • Academic Capacity - measured by the graduates 'performance in tertiary education.

    What's the Goal?? 2008

  • It seems like adding figure-tertiary is just making up semantics to satisfy presentational concerns.

    A design pattern for image and figure alignment | FactoryCity 2007

  • Figure 2 shows payments in 2007 by one large private insurer for appendectomies (then code DRG 107) and coronary bypass grafts with cardiac catheterization (code CABG, then DRG 107) in California at what are known as "tertiary hospitals" - those with the ability to support medical specialists in medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, surgery, their subspecialties and ancillary services.

    NYT > Home Page By UWE E. REINHARDT 2011

  • This can be best achieved through the creation of CEDAW clubs in tertiary institutions with the major aims of building a culture of Women’s Human Rights activism and advocacy among Nigerian Youths and also to build gender discrimination-free culture on campus and among Nigerian youths. in conclusion, Youth involvement in promoting and development of Women’s Human Rights in achieving gender equality is very vital and essential.

    Archive 2008-03-01 2008

  • The segmentation of cargo involves a veritable Russian Doll of containment, beginning with the outermost layer of pallets and the materials used to hold them to the product they carry — “tertiary” or “transit” packaging in logistics parlance.

    On Stretch Wrap Anna Pendergrast 2023

  • Focused deterrence is what is known as secondary or tertiary prevention, to stop violence happening again in someone’s life.

    The zombie knives ban is a small step forward – but the focus needs to be on the child holding the blade | Ciaran Thapar Ciaran Thapar 2024

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.