What does ment mean?
I was asked, ‘‘What does ment mean?’’ at the end of thousands of words, from moment and
cement to parliament and sacrament?
Short answer
The short answer would be, that ment doesn’t mean anything; it doesn’t have to. Being a suffix, like ing or ed, or
able, ible, ity, ism, it has function without independent meaning; ment makes a noun out of a verb, that is, a thing or concept from some action.
Move—> movement; defer—>deferment.
Good question
It’s a good question though, prompting several more. If suffixes can function but don’t mean, what about prefixes? In making a noun from a verb, and Latinderived at that, how does
ment differ from tion, ation, ing, and so on? Why does English have many ways of making nouns from verbs? I’ll take these further questions one by one.
Prefixing
Prefixes too, like un or pre or
post, do not have independent existence from their function, yet they do have meaning. Granted that un is pure function, to negate, prefixes formed from prepositions do mean something. Fore in
foreword, and pre in prefix, show their original idea of ‘‘before’’ (both in literal positioning and in their idea of primacy or preparation). Pre is Latin prae, ‘‘before’’. As indeed, in prefix.
The sub of suffix, assimilated in sound into suffix, means ‘‘under’’ or subordinated. What suffixes share with prefixes is lack of independent wordstatus — at least till context or usage decrees otherwise . . .
ation, tion, sion, son
Fixation, question, lesion, and liaison: don’t these also turn out to make a noun meaning an action first coined as a verb? English is prodigal! In the original Latin, however, the tio words kept closer to the activity itself than they do in English: the mentum words to its outcome, physical or social. This isn’t so clear in English. Fiction means making up, whereas
figment means something made up. But move gives us movement and motion and momentum and moment.
There’s more
Even alienlooking words like
flotsam and jetsam (which gave the name long ago to a musichall duo) belong in this bunch. Older French formed flotatio into flotsam, and iactatio
into jetsam. Also jettison, now a verb again, from jeter. . . The differentiation is useful, and comes from use. We’re sampling the mixed origins of our wordstock.
Encouragement
I prefer the solidity of ment words to the more numerous ation ones. Digitisation and
facilitation: these sound weedy, compared with weighty
judgment and acknowledgment.
A fine group begins with /e/:
endearment, endowment, enlargement, entrenchment.
Better still, embodiment. Best of all, encouragement, great word for that healthy, friendly action:
en + French corage + ment,
‘‘giving heart’’ to someone who needs it.
John Bunyan
John Bunyan even makes a
ment word into strong rhyme.
Who would true valour see?/ Let him come hither/ One here will constant be/ Come wind, come weather./ There’s no
discouragement/ Shall make him once relent/ His first avowed intent/ To be a pilgrim. The rhymes climb. Sung to its great folk tune, Monk’s Gate, the poem is itself an encouragement, disabling the many reasons we
have for doing nothing. Who so beset him round/ With dismal stories/ Do but themselves confound/ His strength the more is/ . . . // Then fancies, fly away/ He’ll fear not what men say/ He’ll labour night and day/ To be a pilgrim. I feel better already.