Where does “healthful” come from?
Healthful comes from Middle English helþeful, a derivative formation from the noun health with the productive suffix -ful meaning "full of" or "characterized by."
healthful (English): Beneficial to bodily health; Conducive to moral...
Definitions
- Beneficial to bodily health; Conducive to moral...
Ancestry of “healthful”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | English | -ful | Used to form adjectives from nouns. Full of,... |
| 2 | Middle English | -ful | Appended to nouns to form adjectives denoting... |
| 3 | Old English | -ful | full of; -ful |
| 4 | Proto-Germanic | -fullaz | -ful |
| 5 | Proto-Germanic | fullaz | full; the whole, the entire |
| 6 | Proto-Indo-European | pl̥h₁nós | full |
| 7 | Proto-Indo-European | pleh₁- | to fill |
Words derived from “healthful”