elementary

Relating to the basic, essential or fundamental part of something.

Adjective

  1. Relating to the basic, essential or fundamental part of something.
  2. Very simple.
  3. Relating to an elementary school.
  4. Fundamental: serving as a building block for more complicated structures or processes.
    • The physics of elementary particles in the 20th century was distinguished by the observation of particles whose existence had been predicted by theorists sometimes decades earlier. - 2012 March 5, Jeremy Bernstein, “A...

    1. (physics) Relating to a subatomic particle.

    2. (chemistry, of a reaction) Involving only a single reaction step and transition state.

    3. (mathematics, of a square matrix) Which performs a row or column operation on another matrix when the two are multiplied; see Elementary matrix on Wikipedia.Wikipedia (Such matrices are called "elementary" because they generate the general linear group).

    4. (mathematics, of a symmetric polynomial) Arising from Vieta's formulas; see Elementary symmetric polynomial on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

  5. Straightforward, employing only basic techniques; not requiring substantial knowledge (of some particular domain, object, etc.).

    1. (number theory, of an argument or proof, mostly historical outside the phrase "Elementary number theory") Making no use of complex analysis.

  6. Sublunary; not celestial; belonging to the sublunary sphere, to which the four classical elements (earth, air, fire and water) were confined; composed of or pertaining to these four elements.

Origin

From Middle English elementare, from Latin elementārius (“elementary”), from elementum (“one of the four elements of antiquity; fundamentals”) + -ārius (adjective-forming suffix). Cognate with French élémentaire. By surface analysis, element + -ary.

Forms

more elementary most elementary elementar elem

Derived

elementarily elementariness elementarism elementary algebra elementary cellular automaton elementary charge elementary equivalence elementary function elementary matrix elementary, my dear Watson elementary particle elementary school elementary schooler elementary spaceship elementary substance elementary symmetric polynomial elementary topos monoelementary nonelementary postelementary subelementary superelementary unelementary

Noun

  1. Ellipsis of elementary school.
    • At Lakeside Elementary I learned to appreciate the forest.
    • He was my dentist. My mom took me to him back in elementary and junior high. - 2011 May 3, Lee Livingston, “Cleveland – Summer of 1962”, in In the Rearview Mirror: A Road Trip into the Heart of Another Country – America...
  2. A supernatural being associated with the elements.
    • The demon (or elementary) of the South-West wind was particularly dreaded, as being the gini of fever and madness. - 1936, Rollo Ahmed, The Black Art, London: Long, page 45:
    • […] the spiritual man is either translated like Enoch and Elias to the higher state, or falls down lower than an elementary again […] - 2003, H P Blavatsky, The Letters of H. P. Blavatsky, volume 1:
    • But, in Africa these became definite in their Egyptian Types, by means of which we can follow their development from the elementaries of Chaos and Space into Celestial Intelligencers […] - 2007, Gerald Massey, The...

Forms

elementaries elementar elem