Word.ws English Dictionary

te

/tiː/

te noun: in solfège, the seventh note of a major scale (the note B in the fixed-do system): ti.

Noun (1)

te (plural tes)

  1. (obsolete) In solfège, the seventh note of a major scale (the note B in the fixed-do system): ti.
    Synonyms:
    si
  2. In solfège, the lowered seventh note of a major scale (the note B-flat in the fixed-do system): ta.
    Synonyms:
    ta, B-flat, li

Noun (2)

te (plural tes)

  1. The name of the Cyrillic script letter Т / т.

Noun (3) capitalized: TE

TE (plural TEs)

  1. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of transporter-erector.
  2. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of transposable element.

Proper noun (1) capitalized: Te

Te

  1. (Egyptian) The realm of the dead in Egyptian mythology.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Te

Te

  1. (alternative, historical) Alternative form of De, a former prefecture of imperial China around Dezhou in northwestern Shandong.
    • The next year the reign style was changed to Chʻien-yüan 乾元 (February 13, 758-February 2, 759). Wang Chien 王暕,¹⁷⁸ the bogus Prefect of Te Prefecture 德州, Yü-wen Kʻuan 宇文寛, the bogus Prefect of Pei Prefecture 貝州,¹⁷⁹ and others all renewed their allegiance [to the Tʻang court].1960, “Translation (Chiu Tʻang-shu 200A.1a-5b)”, in Howard S. Levy, transl., Biography of An Lu-shan, Berkley; Los Angeles: University of California Press, translation of original in Chinese, →OCLC...

Examples of te in a sentence

  • Currently, many Kiwis are learning te reo.
  • Are ye gannin te cadge a lift of yoer fatha?
  • The word dis·ín·te·res·ted·ly is stressed on the propreantepenult.

All 40 example sentences with te

Synonyms of te

Forms of te

pluraltes
pluralTEs

Plural of te: tes

Origin of te

Sense 1: Altered from si in the 19th century to prevent having two notes of the musical scale starting with the same letter, to become te and later ti. Sense 2: The vowel of ti then changed to 'e' to signify a flattened note.

From Coptic ⲧⲏ (tē), from Egyptian d-wA-t:dwAt (“dwꜣt”). Doublet of Duat.

From the Wade–Giles romanization of the Mandarin pronunciation of Mandarin 德 (Dé, “virtue, manliness”).

Phrases with te

Words that rhyme with te

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about te

What does te mean?
Te means in solfège, the seventh note of a major scale (the note B in the fixed-do system): ti.
What part of speech is te?
Te can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce te?
Te is pronounced /tiː/.
What is the plural of te?
The plural of te is tes.

Words near te in the dictionary

  1. TdTs
  2. TDW
  3. tdy
  4. TDZ
  5. TDZs
  6. te
  7. Te Anau
  8. Te Ao Māori
  9. Te Deum
  10. Te Deums
  11. Te Horo

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: te (page history and authors); TE (page history and authors); Te (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-te.ogg.

Cite this entry: “te.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/te. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.