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  • English Word -able Definition An adjective suffix now usually in a passive sense; able to be; fit to be; expressing capacity or worthiness in a passive sense; as, movable, able to be moved; amendable, able to be amended; blamable, fit to be blamed; salable.
  • English Word -ably Definition A suffix composed of -able and the adverbial suffix -ly; as, favorably.
  • English Word -ana Definition A suffix to names of persons or places, used to denote a collection of notable sayings, literary gossip, anecdotes, etc. Thus, Scaligerana is a book containing the sayings of Scaliger, Johnsoniana of Johnson, etc.
  • English Word -ance Definition A suffix signifying action; also, quality or state; as, assistance, resistance, appearance, elegance. See -ancy.
  • English Word -ances Definition of Discrepancy
  • English Word -ancies Definition of Discrepancy
  • English Word -ancy Definition A suffix expressing more strongly than -ance the idea of quality or state; as, constancy, buoyancy, infancy.
  • English Word -ant Definition A suffix sometimes marking the agent for action; as, merchant, covenant, servant, pleasant, etc. Cf. -ent.
  • English Word -arch Definition A suffix meaning a ruler, as in monarch (a sole ruler).
  • English Word -ard Definition Alt. of -art
  • English Word -art Definition The termination of many English words; as, coward, reynard, drunkard, mostly from the French, in which language this ending is of German origin, being orig. the same word as English hard. It usually has the sense of one who has to a high or excessive degree the quality expressed by the root; as, braggart, sluggard.
  • English Word -ate Definition As an ending of participles or participial adjectives it is equivalent to -ed; as, situate or situated; animate or animated.
  • English Word -ate Definition As the ending of a verb, it means to make, to cause, to act, etc.; as, to propitiate (to make propitious); to animate (to give life to).
  • English Word -ate Definition As a noun suffix, it marks the agent; as, curate, delegate. It also sometimes marks the office or dignity; as, tribunate.
  • English Word -ate Definition In chemistry it is used to denote the salts formed from those acids whose names end -ic (excepting binary or halogen acids); as, sulphate from sulphuric acid, nitrate from nitric acid, etc. It is also used in the case of certain basic salts.
  • English Word -ation Definition A suffix forming nouns of action, and often equivalent to the verbal substantive in -ing. It sometimes has the further meanings of state, and that which results from the action. Many of these nouns have verbs in -ate; as, alliterate -ation, narrate -ation; many are derived through the French; as, alteration, visitation; and many are formed on verbs ending in the Greek formative -ize (Fr. -ise); as, civilization, demoralization.
  • English Word A Definition The name of the sixth tone in the model major scale (that in C), or the first tone of the minor scale, which is named after it the scale in A minor. The second string of the violin is tuned to the A in the treble staff. -- A sharp (A/) is the name of a musical tone intermediate between A and B. -- A flat (A/) is the name of a tone intermediate between A and G.
  • English Word A Definition The first letter of the English and of many other alphabets. The capital A of the alphabets of Middle and Western Europe, as also the small letter (a), besides the forms in Italic, black letter, etc., are all descended from the old Latin A, which was borrowed from the Greek Alpha, of the same form; and this was made from the first letter (/) of the Phoenician alphabet, the equivalent of the Hebrew Aleph, and itself from the Egyptian origin. The Aleph was a consonant letter, with a guttural breath sound that was not an element of Greek articulation; and the Greeks took it to represent their vowel Alpha with the a sound, the Phoenician alphabet having no vowel symbols.
  • English Word A Definition An expletive, void of sense, to fill up the meter
  • English Word A Definition Of.
  • English Word A Definition In process of; in the act of; into; to; -- used with verbal substantives in -ing which begin with a consonant. This is a shortened form of the preposition an (which was used before the vowel sound); as in a hunting, a building, a begging.
  • English Word A Definition In; on; at; by.
  • English Word A Definition In each; to or for each; as, "twenty leagues a day", "a hundred pounds a year", "a dollar a yard", etc.
  • English Word A Definition An adjective, commonly called the indefinite article, and signifying one or any, but less emphatically.
  • English Word A Definition A barbarous corruption of have, of he, and sometimes of it and of they.
  • English Word A 1 Definition A registry mark given by underwriters (as at Lloyd's) to ships in first-class condition. Inferior grades are indicated by A 2 and A 3.
  • English Word A B C Definition The simplest rudiments of any subject; as, the A B C of finance.
  • English Word A B C Definition A primer for teaching the alphabet and first elements of reading.
  • English Word A B C Definition The first three letters of the alphabet, used for the whole alphabet.
  • English Word A cappella Definition A time indication, equivalent to alla breve.