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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

initiative.

Serving to initiate.

10 characters4 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/ɪˈnɪʃ.ə.tɪv/
  1. Serving to initiate.

    archaic · not-comparable
  2. In which voter initiatives can be brought to the ballot.

    US · not-comparable
Where this word comes from

From French initiative, from Medieval Latin *initiativus (“serving to initiate”), from Late Latin initiare (“to begin, to initiate”), from Latin initium (“beginning”), from ineo (“enter, begin”). By surface analysis, initiate + -ive.

noun/ɪˈnɪʃ.ə.tɪv/
  1. A beginning; a first move.

    countable · uncountable
  2. A new development; a fresh approach to something; a new way of dealing with a problem.

    countable · uncountable
  3. The ability to act first or on one's own.

    countable · uncountable
  4. An issue to be voted on, brought to the ballot by a sufficient number of signatures from among the voting public.

    countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

From French initiative, from Medieval Latin *initiativus (“serving to initiate”), from Late Latin initiare (“to begin, to initiate”), from Latin initium (“beginning”), from ineo (“enter, begin”). By surface analysis, initiate + -ive.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.