re-
English
Etymology
From Middle English re-, from Old French re-, from Latin re-, red- (“back; anew; again; against”), of uncertain origin but conjectured by Watkins to be from Proto-Indo-European *wret-, a metathetic alteration of *wert- (“to turn”). Displaced native English ed-, eft-, a-, with-/wither-, gain-/again-.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ɹiː/, /ɹɪ/, /ɹə/
- IPA: /ɹiː/
- IPA: /ɹɪ/
- IPA: /ɹə/
- IPA: /ɹiː/
Prefix
re-
Usage notes
- The pronunciation varies depending on the word, with /ɹiː/, /ɹɪ/ (some pronunciations), /ɹɛ/ found in words like replay, resist and revolution, respectively.
- The hyphen is not normally included in words formed using this prefix, except when the absence of a hyphen would make the meaning unclear. Hyphens are used in the following cases:
- Sometimes in new coinages and nonce words.
- stir and re-stir the mixture
- When the word that the prefix is combined with begins with a capital letter.
- re-Christianise
- When the word that the prefix is combined with begins with another re-.
- re-record
- In British usage, when the word that the prefix is combined with begins with e.
- re-entry (North American: reentry)
- When the word formed is identical in form to another word in which re- does not have any of the senses listed above.
- The chairs have been re-covered (covered again)
- The chairs have been recovered (obtained back)
- Sometimes in new coinages and nonce words.
- A dieresis may be used instead of a hyphen, as in reëntry. This usage is now rare, but extant; see diaeresis (diacritic) for examples and discussion.
- re- is highly productive, to the point of being almost grammaticalized — almost any verb can have re- applied, especially in colloquial speech. Notable exceptions to this include all forms of be and the modal verbs can, should, etc. When used productively, it is always pronounced /ɹiː/.
Derived terms
Translations
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References
- “re-”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
- Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “re- (prefix),” December 2023, https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/1031113569.
Catalan
Prefix
re-
Derived terms
Further reading
- “re-” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
- “re-”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2024
- “re-” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
- “re-” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.
Esperanto
Prefix
re-
Derived terms
Franco-Provençal
Prefix
re-
- Attaches to verbs, often adding a sense of repetition or reversion.
Derived terms
French
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ʁə/
Audio (file)
Prefix
re-
Derived terms
See also
German
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ʁe/
Audio (file)
Derived terms
Hungarian
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): [ˈrɛ]
Derived terms
Interlingua
Prefix
re-
Derived terms
Italian
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin re-. The prefix re- is borrowed from Latin, while the variant ri- is inherited from Latin.[1]
Usage notes
- The prefix re- normally replaces ri- before words beginning with i, for euphonic reasons.
Derived terms
References
- Migliorini, Bruno with Aldo Duro (1950) Prontuario etimologico della lingua italiana (in Italian), Paravia
Latin
Etymology
The Latin prefix rĕ- is from Proto-Italic *wre (“again”), which has a parallel in Umbrian re-, but its further etymology is uncertain (OED). While it carries a general sense of "back" or "backwards", its precise sense is not always clear, and its great productivity in classical Latin has the tendency to obscure its original meaning.
Watkins proposes a metathesis of Proto-Indo-European *wert- (“to turn”), (Can this(+) etymology be sourced?) while de Vaan suggests Proto-Indo-European *ure- (“back”), which may be found in Proto-Slavic *rakъ (“crayfish, lobster”) (tentatively, in an original sense *“looking backwards”) and Albanian rrë- (“back”, preverb), unless the latter is borrowed from Latin.[1]
Prefix
re-
Usage notes
The prefix anciently also occurs in the form red-, where the -d- is a remnant of the ancient characteristic of the ablative, e.g. in red-do, and with a compositional -i- in redi-vivus. This feature is shared with the preposition se- (originally identical with the conjunction sed), and also in prod-, antid-, postid- (see Lewis & Short, A Latin Dictionary, 1897, s.v. "re" and "D").
The -d- is found before vowels and h, but in later Latin is dropped, as in e.g. reaedifico, reinvito. Assimilation of the d before consonants produced the forms relligio, relliquiae, reccido; and the suppression of the d may account for the frequent lengthening of the e by poets in rēduco, rēlatum.
Derived terms
Descendants
References
- De Vaan, Michiel (2008) “re-, red-”, in Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 516
- R. B. Burnaby (1905) Elegiac Selections from Ovid, page 98
Middle French
Neapolitan
Derived terms
Norman
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Old French re-, from Latin re-.
Derived terms
Norwegian Bokmål
Norwegian Nynorsk
Old French
Polish
Derived terms
Further reading
- re- in Polish dictionaries at PWN
Portuguese
Etymology
From Old Galician-Portuguese re-, from Latin re-.
Pronunciation
- (Brazil) IPA(key): /ʁe/ [he], /ˌʁe/ [ˌhe]
- (Rio de Janeiro) IPA(key): /ʁe/ [χe], /ˌʁe/ [ˌχe]
- (Portugal) IPA(key): /ʁɨ/
Prefix
re-
Derived terms
Romanian
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /re/
Spanish
Etymology 2
Of Proto-Celtic origin, cognate with Irish ró- (“very”). (Can this(+) etymology be sourced?)
Prefix
re-
Derived terms
- Spanish terms prefixed with re-
Further reading
- “re-”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014