Commencement

How to spell commencement

12 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce commencement

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does commencement mean?

1. nounThe start or beginning of something, such as an event, period, or activity.
2. nounA ceremony at which academic degrees or diplomas are conferred on graduating students.

Commencement in a sentence

• The contract takes effect from the commencement of the financial year.

• Her parents flew across the country to attend her commencement at the university.

• Heavy rain delayed the commencement of the building work.

• The dean delivered a short address during the commencement on the lawn.

Where does commencement come from?

Language of origin: French

This word comes through Old French comencement, the noun built on the verb comencier, meaning 'to begin' or 'to start'. That verb traces back to a Vulgar Latin form cominitiare, made from the intensive prefix com- combined with initiare, 'to begin', which itself rests on the Latin noun initium, meaning 'a beginning' or 'entrance'. English borrowed the word in the 1300s, keeping its plain sense of a starting point, and the same initium root still lives openly in the modern word 'initiate'. The American use of commencement for a graduation ceremony is a neat twist: the ritual marks not the end of study but the formal beginning of adult or professional life. The spelling trap sits in the middle, where the soft c before e and the unstressed -ence- pattern tempt writers toward a wrong vowel or a missing letter.

How the word is built

• com- (intensive, fully)
• mence (from Old French comencier: to begin)
• -ment (noun suffix)