formerly -at, forming sbs. derived from L. sbs. in -ātus (-ato- and -atu-), -ātum, -āta, and their modern Romanic representatives.
1. In popular words which lived on into OFr., L. -ātus, -ātum, became (through -ato, -ado, -ad, -ed, -et) -é, as cūrātus, senātus, avocātus, stātus, peccātum, OF. curé, sené, avoué, esté, péché; learned words, adapted from Latin, took -at, as in estat, prelat, primat, magistrat. After 13th c. many of the popular words were refashioned with -at, as sené, senat, avoué, avocat; and all new words have been thus formed, e.g., assassinat, attentat, épiscopat, palatinat, professorat, syndicat. In Eng. these were originally adopted in their Fr. form, estat, prelat, etc.; after 1400, -e was added to mark the long vowel, estate, prelate, etc., and all later words from Fr. took -ate at once. After these, Eng. words are formed directly on L., as curātus ‘curate,’ or on L. analogies, as alderman-ate, cf. triumvir-ate. In meaning, words in -ate are chiefly: a. Substantives denoting office or function, or the persons performing it, as marquisate, professorate, episcopate, syndicate, aldermanate. b. Participial nouns, as legate ‘one deputed,’ prelate ‘one preferred,’ mandate ‘a thing commanded,’ precipitate ‘what is thrown down.’ c. Chemical terms, denoting salts formed by the action of an acid on a base, as nitrate, acetate, sulphate, carbonate, alcoholate, ethylate. In the 18th c. chemists said plumbum acetatum ‘acetated lead,’ lead acted on by vinegar, whence substantively acetatum the acetated (product), the ‘acetate’; cf. precipitate, sublimate, distillate. (In the dog-latin of pharmacy, acetas, -ātis, is ignorantly put for acetātum.)
2. In some words, -ate = F. -ate, ad. L. or It. -āta, as in pirate, frigate.
