preternatural
adjective
G. L. Dickinson
Did you know?
Preternatural comes from the Latin phrase praeter naturam, meaning "beyond nature." Medieval Latin scholars rendered this as praeternaturalis, and that form inspired the modern English word. Things beyond nature—i.e., very unusual things—can be alarming, and in its earliest documented uses in the late 1500s, preternatural was applied to strange, ominous, or abnormal phenomena, from works of God to signs of illness and disease. But by the 1800s things were looking up for preternatural, with the word describing remarkable abilities of exceptional humans, as it most often does today.
Examples of preternatural in a Sentence
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
1 July 2026
Excelling in amateur baseball’s highest levels the past six years seems to have created preternatural ease.
—
Dan Hayes,
New York Times,
1 July 2026
Marina, for her part, reacts to every new face and each fresh piece of information with an instinctive guardedness—and Garcia illuminates, with an almost sphinx-like half smile, the preternatural reserve of someone who’s grown up knowing not to expect too much from people.
—
Justin Chang,
New Yorker,
26 June 2026
Michelle Wie the phenom, the preternatural teenage golfer from Hawaii who turned pro at age 16 to massive amounts of attention and endorsements.
—
Jim Alexander,
Oc Register,
6 June 2026
See All Example Sentences for preternatural
Cite this Entry
“Preternatural.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/preternatural. Accessed 5 Jul. 2026.
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preternatural
adjective
