There is of course something fundamental in every word that distinguishes it from other words; but this does not exhaust the whole meaning of most words. Only when used in a sentence, with other words, in a context, does a word acquire its full and precise meaning. By stripping a word of the connotation and denotation which it shows in many contexts, there is left, as it were, a common denominator; and it is as a result of this logical operation that we assign a meaning to a detached and isolated word. Caution must also be exercised in speaking of the “meaning” of suffixes. Isolated suffixes have a meaning even less than words do. It is incorrect to say that _-mentum_, or _-bulum_, or _-culum_ means instrument; the nouns made with them may have this meaning, but the suffixes are perhaps colorless in themselves. This is true of suffixes used to form other parts of speech as well as nouns; _e. g._, a suffix forming an adjective signifying material or appurtenance cannot be said to _mean_ “made of,” “belonging to,” or “full of,” although its equivalence to such expressions can be shown when in each occurrence of the adjective the relation of the stem of the adjective to the governing noun is taken into consideration. The etymology of the three suffixes will be explained in Chapter IV. The investigation of my material revealed at least two fairly definite influences at work on any single meaning of a word: (1) Stem-meaning; (2) Context; while (3) a very important factor in illustrating the variability and non-stability of the suffixes is seen in comparing them with other suffixes on the same stem, noting their similarity or difference, and finding if possible the reason for it. A chapter will be devoted to each one of these main topics. Sometimes all three of these factors exert their influence on a word, more often one or both of the first two make the meaning clear. The first, or stem-meaning, regularly gives a general meaning to the word, while the context gives a special or more precise meaning. As far as possible only one influence will be discussed in each chapter, but as the determination of the meaning of a word is so complex a process, a slight overlapping will be unavoidable in some instances. CHAPTER II INFLUENCE OF STEM-MEANING The examination of the words with a view to finding the influence of stem-meaning is not directly concerned with semantic variability: that will be illustrated in the next chapter. For purposes of classification in this chapter, only the prevailing meaning of each word is considered. For doubtful etymologies, Walde (_Lat. Etym. Wörterbuch_) is taken as guide. I -MENTUM