Attainment

How to spell attainment

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce attainment

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does attainment mean?

1. nounSomething achieved through effort, or the act of reaching a goal or standard.

Attainment in a sentence

• The report measured each pupil's attainment in reading and mathematics.

• Finishing the marathon was the proudest attainment of her career.

Where does attainment come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back through Old French to Latin, beginning with attingere, formed from ad, meaning 'to' or 'toward', and tangere, meaning 'to touch'. The literal sense was therefore 'to touch upon' or 'to reach', and that idea of stretching out and finally reaching something underlies the modern meaning of achieving a goal. English took the verb 'attain' from the Old French ataindre during the 1300s, and the noun 'attainment' was built on it soon after by adding the suffix -ment, which turns a verb into a noun naming its result. The spelling trap lives in the middle: the 'ai' spelling of the 'ain' part comes straight from the French, while the doubled 't' at the start preserves the assimilated ad- prefix. The same tangere root surfaces in everyday relatives such as 'tangent', 'contact', and 'tangible', all of which keep the underlying notion of touching.

How the word is built

• at- (from Latin ad-: to, toward)
• tain (from Latin tangere/tenere: to touch, reach)
• -ment (noun suffix: the result or act)