Etymology Explorer › English

Where does “satisfactory” come from?

Satisfactory comes from Middle French satisfactoire, from Late Latin satisfactorius, from Latin satisfactus, the past participle of satisfacio meaning "to do enough," from facio meaning "to do" and ultimately Proto-Indo-European dʰeh₁- meaning "to put or place."

satisfactory (English): Done to satisfaction; adequate or sufficient;...

Definitions

  1. Done to satisfaction; adequate or sufficient;...

Ancestry of “satisfactory”, step by step

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1Middle Frenchsatisfactoire—
2Late Latinsatisfactorius—
3Latinsatisfactussatisfied
4Latinsatisfacerepresent active infinitive of satisfaciō
5Frenchfaireto do; to make; to say , to go
6Middle Frenchfaireto do; to make; to choose; to elect
7Old Frenchfaireto do
8Latinfaciō—
9Latin-toriumnominative neuter singular of -tōrius; accusative...
10Latin-tōrius—
11Latin-tor-er
12Proto-Italic-tōr—
13Proto-Indo-European-tōrDerives agent nouns from verbs, denoting someone...
14Proto-Indo-European-tor-s—

Words derived from “satisfactory”

  • unsatisfactory
  • satisfactorily
  • unsatisfactorily
  • unsatisfactoriness
  • satisfactoriness
  • dissatisfactory
  • dissatisfactoriness
Every word from Proto-Indo-European -tor-s →