Other forms: dispositions
Somebody's disposition is the mood or temper they naturally have. A cheerful disposition, a nervous disposition, of a sunny disposition.
It describes the settled tendency rather than a passing mood, and it is faintly old-fashioned and warm. Of a nervous disposition is a fixed phrase used in warnings before frightening films. The other senses are the arrangement of things — the disposition of troops — and, in law, the disposal of property or the outcome of a case. Note disposed, meaning inclined: disposed to agree.
1noundispositionThe mood or temper a person naturally has.
“She has a sunny disposition and rarely gets upset.”
2nounarrangementThe arrangement of things.
“The general studied the disposition of the enemy troops on the map.”
disposition is a settled tendency or arrangement.
Latin dispositio means an arranging, from disponere — dis- plus ponere, to place. Somebody's disposition is how they are arranged inside, which is a more mechanical picture than the warm modern use suggests.
Latin
dispositiōnem
Middle French
disposition
Middle English
disposicioun
English, today
disposition
From Middle English disposicioun, from Middle French disposition, from Latin dispositiōnem, accusative singular of dispositiō, from dispōnō. by surface analysis, dispose + -ition. a doublet of dispositio.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA