Page:On the history and use of the suffixes -ery (-ry), -age, and -ment in English.djvu/89



The suffix -mentum replaces in Latin the older -men: it is very frequently employed, originally solely in concrete formations expressing the means, result (product) of an action. In late Latin there are also some formations with an abstract sense, as juramentum, cogitamentum, declinamentum, observamentum.

Kr. makes the following remarks on the use of the suffix in French: «Le suffixe -ement a de tout temps été très productif; il est encore, dans la langue actuelle d'une singulière richesse. On trouve dans presque tous les auteurs modernes des mots nouvaux en -ement exprimant, soit l'action verbale abstraite indiquée par le radical, soit l'etat, soit l'objet qui résulte de cette action – – – » e. g. avancement, commencement, emportement, recueillement, logement, établissement.

(a) Formations expressing: Action, State. (cf. pp. 122 135).

By far the largest number of the French loan-words with -ment in English express abstract ideas. Most of them occur in the sense of action. The earliest loan-words occur in the thirteenth century; in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the adoptions are very numerous; but after 1600 they become rare.