Etymology

postpositive

P3O1S1T1P3O1S1I1T1I1V4E1

Today it means: Placed after the word modified, either immediately after, as in two men abreast, or as part of a complement, as in those two men are bad. Full definition →

English positive ← Old French positif ← Latin positivus
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*pós
  2. Proto-Indo-European*pósti
  3. Proto-Italic*posti
  4. Old Latinposte
  5. Latinpost
  6. Englishpost-
  7. Proto-Indo-European*h₂ep
  8. Proto-Indo-European*h₂epó
  9. Proto-Indo-European*h₂pó
  10. Proto-Italic*po
  11. Proto-Indo-European*teḱ-
  12. Proto-Indo-European*tḱéytibf.
  13. Proto-Indo-European*tḱey-
  14. Proto-Indo-European*tḱinéti
  15. Proto-Italic*sinō
  16. Proto-Italic*pozinō
  17. Latinpōnō
  18. Latinīvus
  19. Latinpositivus
  20. Old Frenchpositif
  21. Englishpositive
  22. English todaypostpositive

From post- + positive.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.