clement
1 Americanadjective
-
mild or merciful in disposition or character; lenient; compassionate.
A clement judge reduced his sentence.
-
(of the weather) mild or temperate; pleasant.
noun
adjective
-
merciful
-
(of the weather) mild
Other Word Forms
- clemently adverb
- overclement adjective
Etymology
Origin of clement
First recorded in 1425–75; late Middle English either from Old French or directly from Latin clēment-, stem of clēmēns “gentle, merciful”
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Such worlds might resemble the large moons of our outer solar system and harbor potentially clement conditions beneath an icy crust.
From Scientific American
A planet’s atmosphere plays an even bigger role; if it’s loaded with greenhouse gases, then it needs to be farther out from the star to be clement.
From Scientific American
For those of us hoping to find more clement Earth-like worlds, that wasn’t very satisfying.
From Scientific American
The Hampden pitch bore the scars of Saturday's semi-final being played in horrible weather but Sunday's more clement conditions made for an engrossing tie.
From BBC
Billions of years ago, before it became a freeze-dried desert, the Red Planet was much more Earth-like, with liquid water and clement temperatures at its surface.
From Scientific American
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
