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Glite Dictionary
🔥 Hardening metal ⚖️ Making milder
tempering

tempering

5.6
Making a feeling, rule, or action less strong
  • noun
  • /ˈtɛmpərɪŋ/
translation icon : moderación
  • His tempering attitude during negotiations helped to create a more collaborative environment.

Examples

  • But watch out, the Pope is now engaged in the Cuban issue, and this has resulted in a welcome tempering of American sanctions against Cuba.

    Academic text (1998)

  • How helpful that has been to tempering emotional reactivity.

  • We need a certain amount of tempering, but we should work to maintain our connections to each other and ourselves.

    Blog text (18)

  • Tempering is central to chocolate making.

    Academic text (2011)

  • Tempering's better for the long haul.

    Saw V (2008)

  • Carpenter pointed out in 1953 that American democracy did go on after Melville's time to include the tempering of justice with mercy even in its martial law.

    Academic text (1993)

  • Tempering our tempering responses to criticism can help us maintain better relationships with others.

  • The teacher emphasized the importance of tempering enthusiasm with realistic expectations in her class.

Synonyms

moderation
vstempering
5 3.7

Making something less strong or intense

is used for the same process but often emphasizes measured reduction
damping
vstempering
1 5.3

A drop in strength or level of something, like noise and excitement

is broader, focusing on lowering severity or extremes rather than only strength
moderating
vstempering
4.4

Making something less strong or extreme

is the name of that process rather than the active doing of it
tapering
vstempering
6.5

A slow reduction in size or amount done in stages

is about reducing severity generally, not specifically gradual staged reduction

Antonyms

severity
11 6.4

Being very strict and harsh when judging or punishing people

How Tempered

moderation
47 3.5
tempering
5.6
softening
8 2.7
mitigation
16 5.6
alleviation
4 5.2

Surface Forms

tempering singular
tempering plural

Morphology

tempering = temper (transparent) = temper + ing

Derived from the verb 'temper' (to moderate) with the nominalizing '-ing'; the sense of moderation is directly predictable.

Etymology

Tempering comes from the old Latin word temperare, which meant 'to mix in the right amount' or 'to make steady', and it is the same root behind temperate and temper. So to temper a feeling, a rule, or a punishment is to make it less strong or extreme — to moderate it.