1. (Med.) A disease, especially an intermittent fever, which returns every third day, reckoning inclusively,
or in which the intermission lasts one day.
2. A liquid measure formerly used for wine, equal to seventy imperial, or eighty-four wine, gallons, being
one third of a tun.
Tertiary
(Ter"ti*a*ry) a. [L. tertiarius containing a third part, fr. tertius third: cf. F. tertiaire. See Tierce.]
1. Being of the third formation, order, or rank; third; as, a tertiary use of a word. Trench.
2. (Chem.) Possessing some quality in the third degree; having been subjected to the substitution of
three atoms or radicals; as, a tertiary alcohol, amine, or salt. Cf. Primary, and Secondary.
3. (Geol.) Later than, or subsequent to, the Secondary.
4. (Zoöl.) Growing on the innermost joint of a bird's wing; tertial; — said of quills.
Tertiary age.
(Geol.) See under Age, 8. — Tertiary color, a color produced by the mixture of two
secondaries. "The so-called tertiary colors are citrine, russet, and olive." Fairholt. — Tertiary period.
(Geol.) (a) The first period of the age of mammals, or of the Cenozoic era. (b) The rock formation of
that period; — called also Tertiary formation. See the Chart of Geology. — Tertiary syphilis (Med.),
the third and last stage of syphilis, in which it invades the bones and internal organs.
Tertiary
(Ter"ti*a*ry), n.; pl. Tertiaries
1. (R. C. Ch.) A member of the Third Order in any monastic system; as, the Franciscan tertiaries; the
Dominican tertiaries; the Carmelite tertiaries. See Third Order, under Third. Addis & Arnold.
2. (Geol.) The Tertiary era, period, or formation.
3. (Zoöl.) One of the quill feathers which are borne upon the basal joint of the wing of a bird. See Illust.
of Bird.
Tertiate
(Ter"ti*ate) v. t. [L. tertiatus, p. p. of tertiare to do for the third time, fr. tertius the third.]
1. To do or perform for the third time. [Obs. & R.] Johnson.
2. (Gun.) To examine, as the thickness of the metal at the muzzle of a gun; or, in general, to examine
the thickness of, as ordnance, in order to ascertain its strength.
Terutero
(||Ter`u*ter"o) n. [Probably so named from its city.] (Zoöl.) The South American lapwing (Vanellus
Cayennensis). Its wings are furnished with short spurs. Called also Cayenne lapwing.
Terza rima
(||Ter"za ri"ma) [It., a third or triple rhyme.] A peculiar and complicated system of versification,
borrowed by the early Italian poets from the Troubadours.
Terzetto
(||Ter*zet"to) n. [It., dim. of terzo the third, L. tertius. See Tierce.] (Mus.) A composition in
three voice parts; a vocal (rarely an instrumental) trio.
Tesselar
(Tes"sel*ar) a. [L. tessella a small square piece, a little cube, dim. of tessera a square piece
of stone, wood, etc., a die.] Formed of tesseræ, as a mosaic.
Tessellata
(||Tes`sel*la"ta) n. pl. [NL. See Tessellate.] (Zoöl.) A division of Crinoidea including numerous
fossil species in which the body is covered with tessellated plates.