Talk:-ess

Usage notes
I've undone the reversion of my edit of 17 Jan, on the basis that my edit was made in good faith and no reasoning is given for the reversion. If there is a genuine difference of opinion on what the second usage note should say then I'm happy to discuss. 62.30.205.46 18:09, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

Can u Give examples of those nouns formed from verbs by the suffix -ess. AsaP

-or as a "feminizing" suffix?
The suffix "-or" is listed under "Synonyms" as being a "female suffix", just like "-ess". Is this a mistake? The others are pretty obvious (e.g., -a, -ette, -euse, -rix, she-), but I can't come up with an example for -or. Can someone else? - dcljr 01:15, 6 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I think the contributor's idea is that now, because a female can be called an actor, -or is a feminine suffix. Obviously it is now both a masculine and a gender-neutral one. DCDuring TALK 02:15, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

what
"Not to be confused with -ness, especially in words like lioness, baroness, etc."

you literally listed LIONESS as an example of -ess suffix which it is

and when you click the "-ness" you're not supposed to confuse "-ess" with, you get to -ness suffix in darkness, calmness etc.

what


 * It's saying not confuse words that end in -n that are given the suffix -ess to have the suffix -ness. E.g. it's lion + -ess, not lio + -ness. Baron + -ess, not baro + -ness.

-esses: reduplicated plural
In the Sussex dialect, however, until relatively recently there existed a reduplicated plural: e.g. one ghost, two ghostes/ghostesses; one post, two postes/postesses (note that here the Sussex pluralisation instead of adding just 's' after 'st', adds either 'es' as its usual plural, or a reduplicated 'esses'.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduplicated_plural

--Backinstadiums (talk) 12:30, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Usage note: pronunciation
There is great interspeaker variability in the treatment of this suffix. See individual entries. JMGN (talk) 16:26, 16 June 2024 (UTC)