Revision 109302997 of "Sub-" on enwiki

{{Not verified|date=February 2007}}

The English [[Prefix (linguistics)|prefix]] [[sub-]] first appeared in the [[Middle English]] period and seems to have been borrowed directly from [[Classical Latin|Latin]]{{Fact|date=February 2007}}, although it previously existed in words borrowed from [[Old French]].  In Latin it was both a prefix and a [[preposition]] and they both had meanings (that survive in English) ranging from
*1. "under, beneath" (examples: [[subterranean]], [[submarine]])
*2. "subsidiary, secondary" (example: [[subplot]])
*3. "almost, nearly" (example: [[subhuman]])
==Forms==
*Its variant forms are: (combination with 's' involves [[elision]] and the rest involve [[assimilation (linguistics)|assimilation]])
*sub + c = suc- (example [[succession]])
*sub + f = suf- (example [[suffer]])
*sub + g = sug- (example [[suggestion]])
*sub + p = sup- (example [[support]])
*sub + r = sur- (example [[resurrection]])
*sub + s = su- (example [[suspect]])

[[Category:Prefixes|List of English prefixes]]