Meanings
- phrasalSynonym of time flies.
TEMPUS FUGIT!! And Christmas has Come Again, and with all its Joys and Pleasures, not the least of which IS THE ONE OF GIVING!!
1880 December 19, “D. Crawford & Co.”, in St. Louis Globe-Democrat, volume 6, number 203, St. Louis, Mo., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 1, column 11 more example
Suddenly the assemblage began to sing. "Let the flag of the kingdom, so graceful and fair, / Be raised while its citizens sing, / 'Hurrah! Tempus Fugit!' the national air, / And kneel to our glorious king!
1908, Percy Keese Fitzhugh, King Time: Or The Mystical Land of the Hours, a Fantasy, New York and Boston: H.M. Caldwell Company, page 181Synonyms: time flies
- Expressing concern that one's limited time is being consumed by something which may have little intrinsic substance or importance at that moment; often, synonym of life is short.
Synonyms & antonyms
proverbSynonym of time flies.
Origin
- Latintempus fugit
- Englishtempus fugit
Borrowed from Latin tempus fugit, from the third book of the Georgics by the Roman poet Virgil (70–19 BCE): sed fugit interea fugit irreparabile tempus (“meanwhile, the irreplaceable time escapes”, literally “but it flees meanwhile: irretrievable time flees”).
More words from Latin
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
tempus fugit. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/tempus%20fugit
“tempus fugit.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/tempus%20fugit. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “tempus fugit,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/tempus%20fugit.
Source: tempus fugit on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.