temporal

Meanings

Adjective

• Of or relating to the material world, as opposed to sacred or clerical.
• Relating to time:
• Of or situated in the temples of the head or the sides of the skull behind the orbits.

Noun

• Anything temporal or secular; a temporality.
• Any of a reptile's scales on the side of the head between the parietal and supralabial scales, and behind the postocular scales.

Origin

• From Middle English temporal, temporel ("transitory, worldly, material, of secular society"), from Old French temporel or Latin temporālis ("of time (in grammar), temporary, relating to time as opposed to eternity"), from tempus + -ālis.
• Middle English, from Middle French timporal, temporal, from Late Latin temporālis, from tempora + -ālis. temporalis.