Master Froggy's
Latin 101

Latin Word Elements
English is a living language, and it is growing all the time. One way that new words come into the language is when words are borrowed from other languages. New words are also created when words or word elements, such as roots, prefixes, and suffixes, are combined in new ways. Many English words and word elements can be traced back to Latin and Greek. Often you can guess the meaning of an unfamiliar word if you know the meaning.
A word root is a part of a word. It contains the core meaning of the word, but it cannot stand-alone.
A prefix is also a word part that cannot stand-alone. It is placed at the beginning of a word to change its meaning.
A suffix is a word part that is placed at the end of a word to change its meaning.
Often you can guess the meaning of an unfamiliar word if you know the meaning of its parts; that is, the root and any prefixes or suffixes that are attached to it.

Latin Roots, Prefixes, and Suffixes
Latin was the language spoken by the ancient Romans. As the Romans conquered most of Europe, the Latin language spread throughout the region. Over time, the Latin spoken indifferent areas developed into separate languages, including Italian, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. These languages are considered “sisters,” as they all descended from Latin, their “mother” language.
In 1066 William, duke of Normandy, conquered England, Normandy is in northern France. For several hundred years after the Norman invasion, French was the language of court and polite society in England. It was during this period that many French words were introduced into English. Linguists estimate that some 60% of our common everyday vocabulary today comes from French.Thus many Latin words came into English indirectly through French, and came into English directly,

Monks from Rome brought religious vocabulary as well as Christianity to England beginning in the 6th century. From the Middle Ages onward many scientific, scholarly, and legal terms were borrowed from Latin. During the 17th and 18th centuries, dictionary writers and grammarians generally felt that English was an imperfect language whereas Latin was perfect. In order to improve the language, they deliberately made up a lot of English words from Latin words. For example, fraternity, from Latin fraternitas, was thought to be better than the native English word brotherhood. Many English words and word parts can be traced back to Latin and Greek.

The following table lists some common Latin roots.

Latin roots
Example words
-dict- to say contradict, dictate, diction, edict, predict
-duc- to lead, bring, take deduce, produce, reduce
-gress- to walk digress, progress, transgress
-ject- to throw eject, inject, interject, project, reject, subject
-pel- to drive compel, dispel, impel, repel
-pend- to hang append, depend, impend, pendant, pendulum
-port- to carry comport, deport, export, import, report, support
-scrib- write describe, description, prescribe, prescription, subscribe, subscription, transcribe, transcription
-tract- to pull, drag, draw attract, contract, detract, extract, protract, retract, traction
-vert- to turn convert, divert, invert, revert

From the example words above, it is easy to see how roots combine with prefixes to form new words. For example, the root -tract-, meaning “to pull,” can combine with a number of prefixes, including de- and re-. Detract means literally “to pull away” (de-, “away, off”) and retract means literally “to pull back” (re-, “again, back”). The following is a list of Latin prefixes and their basic meanings.

Latin prefix

Example words
co- together co-author, co edit, coheir
de- away, off; generally indicates reversal or removal in English deactivate, debone, defrost, decompress, deplane
dis- not, not any disbelief, discomfort, discredit, disrepair, disrespect
inter- between, among international, interfaith, intertwine, intercellular, interject
non- not nonessential, non-metallic, non-resident, non-violence, non-skid, non-stop
post- after postdate, post-war, postnasal, postnatal
pre- before preconceive, pre-exist, premeditate, predispose, prepossess, prepay
re- again; back, backward rearrange, rebuild, recall, remake, rerun, rewrite
sub- under submarine, subsoil, subway, subhuman, substandard
trans- across, beyond, through transatlantic, transpolar

Words and word roots may also combine with suffixes. Here are examples of some important English suffixes that come from Latin

Latin suffix
Example words -able, -ible forms adjectives and means capable or worthy of likable, flexible
-ation forms nouns from verbs create, creation; civilise, civilisation
-fy, -ify forms verbs and means to make or cause to become purify, acidify, humidify
-ment forms nouns from verbs entertain, entertainment; amaze, amazement
-ty, -ity forms nouns from adjectives subtlety, certainty, cruelty, frailty, loyalty, royalty; eccentricity, electricity, peculiarity, similarity, technicality

Latin Verbs (Some compound verbs in English consist of two morphemes: a Latin prefix and a Latin verb.)

That the word aggressive is spelt with gg is due to the fact that it derives from ad + gredior, with -dg-, as it is more difficult to pronounce, having been turned into the easier -gg- (so that *agressive must be considered wrong).

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