tact
/tækt/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.08 in modern English
6
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
3
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
Sensitive mental touch; special skill or faculty; keen perception or discernment; ready power of appreciating and doing what is required by circumstances; the ability to say the right thing and avoid statements that will give offence or pain even if true.
Uncountable
noun
A verbal operant which is controlled by a nonverbal stimulus (such as an object, event, or property of an object) and is maintained by nonspecific social reinforcement (praise).
Countable; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "By the use of tact, she was able to calm her jealous husband."
- "I used tact when I told my fat uncle that his extra weight made him look better."
- "He had formed plans not inferior in grandeur and boldness to those of Richelieu, and had carried them into effect with a tact and wariness worthy of Mazarin."
- "A tact which surpassed the tact of her sex as much as the tact of her sex surpassed the tact of ours."
- "Did you suppose that I could not make myself sensible to tact as well as sight?"
- "Now, sight is a very refined tact."
Etymology
Borrowed from French tact, following a semantic shift from earlier tact (“sense of touch; feeling”), borrowed from Latin tāctus (“touched”). The borrowing was likely influenced by earlier English tact (“sense of touch; feeling”), which was a parallel borrowing directly from the Latin.
Origin
- Source language: Latin