-ite

Used to form nouns denoting followers or adherents of a specified person, idea, doctrine, movement, etc.

Suffix derogatory, morpheme

  1. Used to form nouns denoting followers or adherents of a specified person, idea, doctrine, movement, etc.
    • Adamsite, Campbellite, Jacobite, laborite, Mansonite, Reaganite, Thatcherite
  2. Used to form nouns denoting descendants of a specified historical person, especially a biblical figure.
    • Cainite, Ephraimite, Hamite, Japhetite, Lamanite
    • There were no robbers, nor murderers, neither were there Lamanites, nor any manner of -ites; but they were in one, the children of Christ, and heirs to the kingdom of God. - 1830, Joseph Smith, Book of Mormon,...
  3. Used to form demonyms.
    • Brooklynite, Delhiite, Jerusalemite, Keralite, Kilgoreite, New Jerseyite, Seattleite, Seoulite, Sydneyite, Wisconsinite, Wyomingite; also see ashramite, hostelite
  4. Used to form nouns denoting rocks or minerals.
    • andalusite, anorthosite, anthracite, erythrite, forsterite, graphite, hawleyite, titanite
  5. Used to form nouns denoting fossil organisms.
    • ammonite, belemnite
  6. Used to form nouns denoting segments or components of the body or an organ of the body.
    • dendrite, somite
  7. Used to form nouns denoting the product of a specified process or a commercially manufactured product.
    • Bakelite, cordite, dynamite, ebonite, metabolite, vulcanite
  8. Used to form names of certain chemical compounds, especially salts or esters of acids whose name ends in -ous.
    • bromite, chlorite, iodite, phosphite, sulfite
  9. Used to form nouns for kinds, mostly from bases of Ancient Greek origin.
    • sporozoite, epizoite, troglobite, lychnobite

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *-tósder. Ancient Greek -της (-tēs)der. Ancient Greek -ῑ́της (-ī́tēs)der. Latin -ītēsbor. French -iteder. English -ite From French -ite, from Old French, from Latin -ītēs, from Ancient Greek -ῑ́της (-ī́tēs).

Forms

-ites

Suffix morpheme

  1. Forms adjectives.

Origin

From Latin past participles in -ītus, of verbs in -īre, -ĕre, -ēre, partly via Old French.