Standard Lemma guide
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
Sound
Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.
noun
Chiefly in Semitic languages: Synonym of preformative (“a formative letter, syllable, etc., at the beginning of a word”).
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: archaic, rare
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
History
From pre- (prefix meaning ‘before; physically in front of’) + Latin fōrmāns (“fashioning, forming, shaping”) + -ant (suffix forming agent nouns from verbs), modelled after prefix. Fōrmāns is the present participle of fōrmō (“to fashion, form, format, shape”), from fōrma (“appearance, figure, form, shape; beauty; design, outline, plan; model, mould, pattern, stamp; (figuratively) kind, manner, sort”) (further etymology uncertain) + -ō (suffix forming first-conjugation verbs).
