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saturnism

noun

Simple meaning

Toxic condition produced by the absorption of excessive lead into the system.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

saternihzuhm

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈsætɚnɪzəm

This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. medicinedated

    Toxic condition produced by the absorption of excessive lead into the system

  2. medicinedated

    Lead poisoning

Word at a Glance

Formality
Technical

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

This meaning: Toxic condition produced by the absorption of excessive lead into the system

Used this way, saturnism is an older-sounding word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a clinical use: it belongs to medical description, where it is factual rather than emotive.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Specialist/technical
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Dated
Connotation
Old-fashioned
Usage feel
Dated in modern speech

Where it naturally appears

  • Medicine/healthcare
  • Science
  • Technical/specialist writing
  • Historical writing

Usage note

This meaning still makes sense to most readers, but it sounds a generation behind current usage.

Nearby words

  • plumbism , a specialist term, precise but narrower

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

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More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: toxic condition produced by the absorption of excessive lead into the system

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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.