| 释义 |
▪ I. -ess, suffix1
forming ns. denoting female persons or animals, is a. Fr. -esse:—Com. Romanic -essa:—late L. -issa, a. Gr. -ισσα (:—-ikyā: cf. the OE. fem. agent-suffix -icge:—-igjôn-) occurring in class. Gr. only in βασίλισσα queen (f. βασιλ-εύς king), but after the analogy of this employed in several late formations, as βαλάνισσα bathing-woman, πανδόκισσα female innkeeper. A few of these (notably διακόνισσα, L. diaconissa deaconess) were adopted into late L. together with their correlative masculines, and many new derivatives of the same pattern were formed in Latin, whence they descended into the Romanic langs.; e.g. from abbātem abbot, was formed abbātissa, whence Fr. abbesse abbess. On the analogy of these the suffix became in Romanic the usual means of forming feminine derivatives expressing sex. In ME. many words in -esse were adopted from Fr., as countess, duchess, hostess, lioness, mistress, princess, and several which were formed on ns. in -ëor, -ier (see -er2), as † devoureresse, enchantress, † espyouresse, sorceress. In imitation of these the suffix was in 14th c. appended to Eng. agent-nouns in -er, as in Wyclif's dwelleresse, sleeress (f. sleer = slayer), and to other native words, as in goddess. In 15th c. derivatives in -er + -ess gradually superseded the older Eng. fem. agent-nouns in -ster (OE. -estre), which no longer had an exclusively feminine sense; subsequently the ns. in -ster (exc. spinster) came to be regarded as properly masc., and new feminines in -ess were formed on them, as seamstress, songstress. By writers of 16th and succeeding centuries derivatives in -ess were formed very freely; many of these are now obsolete or little used, the tendency of mod. usage being to treat the agent-nouns in -er, and the ns. indicating profession or occupation, as of common gender, unless there be some special reason to the contrary. Of the words of Eng. formation still in current use, examples are authoress, giantess, Jewess, patroness, poetess, priestess, quakeress, tailoress. In Eng. the suffix is not used to form feminines of names of animals: lioness, tigress being adoptions from Fr. When -ess is added to a n. in -ter, -tor, the vowel before the r is usually elided, as in actress, doctress, protectress, waitress; the derivatives with ending -tress, f. L. agent-nouns in -tor, have in most cases been suggested by, and may be regarded as virtual adaptations of, the corresponding Fr. words in -trice:—L. -trīcem. The substitution of governess (already in Caxton) for the earlier governeresse f. governor was perh. due to false analogy with pairs of words like adulter-er, -ess, cater-er, -ess, sorcer-er, -ess; in conqueress, murderess, adventuress the similar phenomenon is sufficiently explained by phonetic reasons. The existence of such words, in which -ess has the appearance of being added directly to vbs., gave rise in the 17th. c. to formations like confectioness, entertainess, instructess; but none of these obtained general currency.
▪ II. -ess, suffix2
ME. -esse, in ns. a. Fr., represents OF. -esse, -ece, = Pr. -ezza, -eza, Sp. -eza, It. -ezza:—L. -itia, appended to adjs. to form nouns of quality; examples are duress, † humblesse, largess, prowess, † richesse (now riches). These words have been imitated in the pseudo-archaic idlesse, but otherwise the suffix scarcely occurs as an Eng. formative. |