A hidden suffix.

My first suffix? I’ll have to look back and see. Obviously a common suffix, but not one that I had noticed. Indeed, I’m not certain I was really aware of it as being a suffix. Lots of fun words here as examples, too. As usual, the unreproduceable Greek letters are replaced by “*”.

-ad, suffix¹

of ns.

1. repr. Gr. -**-* (nom. -**) forming, a. Collective numerals, as ***** unity, monad, so dyad, triad, tetrad, pentad (especially used to class chemical elements or radicals according to the number of their combining units); hebdomad, chiliad, myriad, etc.; also perissad, Olympiad; decade retains final e from Fr. b. Feminine patronymics (in which it is a phonetic variant of -id), in proper names of females and districts, as Dryad, Naiad, Troad; often in pl. as Pleiad-es, Hyad-es, Cyclad-es. Hence c. in names of Poems, as Iliad, ‘the lay (***) of Ilium,’ often imitated in modern times, as Lusiad, Dunciad, Rosciad, Columbiad; and d. used by Lindley to form family names of plants akin to a genus, as alismad, liliad, trilliad, asclepiad, etc. (on words in -a or after a vowel; otherwise -id, as in orchid).

2. a. Fr. ade-, in salad, ballad; see -ADE the more usual form.

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