Materiality

noun

noun ·6 syllables ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The quality of being material; having a physical existence. countable, uncountable

    "This deed accomplished, life no longer suffers hopelessly under the terrible mutilations of ubiquitous disaster, battered by time, hideous throughout space; but with its horror visible still, its cries of anguish still tumultuous, it becomes penetrated by an all-suffusing, all-sustaining love, and a knowledge of its own unconquered power. Something of the light that blazes invisible within the abysses of its normally opaque materiality breaks forth, with an increasing uproar."

  2. 2
    the quality of being physical; consisting of matter wordnet
  3. 3
    The quality of being of consequence to a legal decision. countable, uncountable
  4. 4
    relevance requiring careful consideration wordnet

Example

More examples

"This deed accomplished, life no longer suffers hopelessly under the terrible mutilations of ubiquitous disaster, battered by time, hideous throughout space; but with its horror visible still, its cries of anguish still tumultuous, it becomes penetrated by an all-suffusing, all-sustaining love, and a knowledge of its own unconquered power. Something of the light that blazes invisible within the abysses of its normally opaque materiality breaks forth, with an increasing uproar."

Etymology

From material (adjective and noun) + -ity, perhaps modelled on Latin māteriālitās.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.