Advisory

How to spell advisory

8 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce advisory

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does advisory mean?

1. adjectiveHaving the function of giving advice or recommendations rather than power to enforce them.
2. nounAn official announcement or warning, often about weather, travel, or safety.

Advisory in a sentence

• adjective

  The committee has an advisory role and cannot overrule the board.

• noun

  The coastguard issued an advisory about high winds along the shore.

• adjective

  She sits on the advisory panel that guides government policy on housing.

• noun

  Travellers checked the latest advisory before booking flights to the region.

Where does advisory come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back through the verb 'advise', which English took from the Old French 'aviser', meaning 'to consider' or 'to take counsel'. That French verb rested on the Latin phrase 'ad visum', literally 'according to what is seen', built from 'ad' (to, toward) and 'videre' (to see), the same root that gives us 'vision' and 'visible'. The underlying idea was that giving counsel meant helping someone see a situation clearly. The adjective and noun 'advisory' were formed in English by attaching the Latin-derived suffix '-ory', which marks something that performs a function, so an advisory body is one that exists to give advice. The spelling trap lives in that unstressed ending: writers expect '-ery' or '-ary', but the correct form keeps the '-ory' that descends straight from the Latin suffix.

How the word is built

• advis- (from advise, ultimately Latin videre 'to see')
• -ory (adjective/noun suffix forming 'relating to or serving to')