Where does “earnings” come from?
Earnings derives from English earning plus the English possessive suffix -'s, which descends through Middle English -s and Old French -esse to Proto-Indo-European suffixes -es and -iskos used to form agent nouns and abstractions.
earnings (English): Wages, money earned, income; Business profits;...
Definitions
- Wages, money earned, income; Business profits;...
Ancestry of “earnings”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | English | -s | Used to form regular plurals of nouns; Used to... |
| 2 | Middle English | -es | Alternative form of -yssh; Alternative form of... |
| 3 | Old English | -es | possessive marker, indicating that an object... |
| 4 | Proto-Germanic | -as | — |
| 5 | Proto-Indo-European | -ēs | Primarily forms adjectival bahuvrīhi compounds |
| 6 | Proto-Indo-European | -ess | — |
| 7 | Proto-Indo-European | -os | Creates action nouns or result nouns from verbs;... |