of the nature of or made or done as a trial, experiment, or attempt; experimental: a tentative report on her findings.
2.
unsure; uncertain; not definite or positive; hesitant: a tentative smile on his face.
Origin: 1580–90; < Medieval Latintentātīvus, equivalent to Latintentāt(us) (past participle of tentāre, variant of temptāre to test; see tempt) + -īvus-ive
a screen or mat covered with a dark material for shielding a camera lens from excess light or glare.
a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.
a gadget; dingus; thingumbob.
a chattering or flighty, light-headed person.
an arrangement of five objects, as trees, in a square or rectangle, one at each corner and one in the middle.
1580s, from M.L. tentativus "trying, testing," from L. tentatus, pp. of tentare "to feel, try," (variant of temptare "to feel, try, test"). Related: Tentatively.