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prefix

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Pronunciation

  • /ˈpɹiːfɪks/, /pɹɛˈfɪks/[1]

Etymology

The verb is inherited from Middle English prefixen,[2][3][4][5] borrowed from Middle French prefixer (“to fix in advance, predetermine”),[6][5][7][4] and, the OED adds, its source borrowed from Latin praefīxus, the past participle of praefīgō (“to fasten in front; in later Latin also to determine beforehand”).[6][7] The French verb is formed from pre- (“before”) and fixer (“to fix, place”),[3][5][4] and is recorded in Anglo-Norman from 1430–31 in the sense of arranging or appointing beforehand.[8] The Latin verb is made of prae- (“before”) and fīgō (“to fasten, fix”),[2][3][9] from Proto-Indo-European *dheigw- (“to stick, fix”).[2][3] The noun is borrowed from New Latin praefīxum, the neuter of the participle used as a noun,[6][3][5][9][10] modelled on the grammatical use of the verb;[6] Barnhart takes the noun of 1646 from the English verb, after an earlier New Latin plural praefixa (1614).[4] In later use the verb was also formed afresh from pre- and fix.[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

To fix, appoint or determine beforehand: 1415, in the records of the city of Norwich.[6][4] Barnhart has the spelling perfixen from 1414,[4] and Etymonline dates the verb to the early 15th century.[2]

Semantic evolution

The first sense was about time: to settle something in advance.[6][2] From the 1530s the verb took on a sense about order and place, to put material at the beginning of a book, first recorded in the Coverdale Bible (1538),[6][4][2] and about 1600 it began to be used in grammar of putting a word or element before another word.[2][6] The grammatical noun followed in 1646, in Sir Thomas Browne's Pseudodoxia Epidemica;[6][4] Johnson (1755) defined it as a particle put before a word to vary its meaning.[11] The noun widened in the 19th century to a title before a person's name (1830) and to a group of symbols at the start of a coded message (1876),[6] and later to the word placed before the registered name of a pedigree animal (1893).[6] Merriam-Webster records an adjective, used of an operator placed before its operands, from 1973.[5] The older sense "to fix beforehand" survives mainly in the hyphenated form pre-fix.[6][5]

Timeline

  • 1415 – to fix or appoint beforehand.[6][4]
  • 1538 – to place at the beginning of a book or text.[6][4]
  • 1605 – in grammar, to place a word or element before a word.[6]
  • 1614 – the New Latin plural prefixa, used in English.[4]
  • 1646 – noun, an element placed at the beginning of a word.[6][4][5]
  • 1830 – a title used before a person's name.[6]
  • 1876 – a sequence of symbols at the start of a coded message.[6]
  • 1893 – in photography, to fix an image beforehand.[6]
  • 1973 – adjective, of an operator placed before its operands.[5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. An affix attached to the beginning of a word or stem to change its meaning, such as pre- in prehistoric.[12][5][6]
  2. A title used before a person's name, such as Dr or Mrs.[5][6]
  3. A group of letters or digits placed at the start of a code, number or message, such as a telephone dialling code.[6]
  4. A word placed before the registered name of a pedigree animal to show where it was bred.[6]
  5. In logic, the quantifiers that come before the rest of a formula.[5]
  6. Something placed before something else.[12]

Verb

  1. To place something at the beginning, or add it in front: She prefixed a short note to the report.[12][5][6]
  2. In grammar, to add an element as a prefix to a word.[12][6]
  3. (archaic) To fix or appoint beforehand.[5][6]

Adjective

  1. Placing an operator before its operands, as in a notation.[5]

Word family

  • prefixal
  • prefixally
  • prefixable
  • unprefixed

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  3. ^ a b c d e The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  8. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
  9. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  12. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins