mettle

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a person's spirit, courage, and resolve under pressure

   The crisis tested the young captain's mettle.

A variant spelling of metal (from Old French metal, from Latin metallum 'metal, mine', from Greek métallon), originally a figurative use of 'metal' for a person's intrinsic quality or temper; the spellings diverged in the 17th century.

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