Word Direct Answers

What does "ordinate" mean?

Ordinate: Well-ordered; orderly; regular; methodical. "A life blissful and ordinate." Chaucer. Ordinate figure (Math.), a figure whose sides and angles are equal; a regular figure.

Additional senses

  1. 2.The distance of any point in a curve or a straight line, measured on a line called the axis of ordinates or on a line parallel to it, from another line called the axis of abscissas, on which the corresponding abscissa of the point is measured. Note: The ordinate and abscissa, taken together, are called coördinates, and define the position of the point with reference to the two axes named, the intersection of which is called the origin of coördinates. See Coordinate.
  2. 3.To appoint, to regulate; to harmonize. Bp. Hall.

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