contemporaneous

Everyday

1. (formal) Existing or happening at the same time as something else: «contemporaneous accounts of the battle». tree →
2. Contemporaneous notes or records: written down at the time something happened, not later. tree →

In the lessons

In history lessons, «contemporaneous sources» (also called primary sources or contemporary sources) are records written at the time of an event, such as diaries, letters and newspapers; historians trust them more about details than later retellings. In law, police make contemporaneous notes. Phrases: «contemporaneous with», «contemporaneous accounts», «contemporaneous records».

Examples

• Samuel Pepys wrote a contemporaneous account of the Great Fire of London. tree →
• The dinosaurs were not contemporaneous with humans. tree →
• Historians compared two contemporaneous reports of the battle. tree →
• The police officer made contemporaneous notes. tree →
• The building of the two castles was roughly contemporaneous. tree →
• Diaries are useful because they are contemporaneous with the events. tree →

Note

Very formal. Said «kon-tem-puh-RAY-nee-us». It is close to «contemporary», but «contemporary» can also mean «modern, of today» (contemporary art), while «contemporaneous» only means «of the same time as something else». A common myth in cartoons is that dinosaurs and cave people lived together; they were not contemporaneous: the last big dinosaurs died about 66 million years before humans.