Commencing

How to spell commencing

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce commencing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does commencing mean?

1. verbIn the act of beginning or starting something, especially in a formal or official context.

Commencing in a sentence

• The renovation work is commencing next Monday, weather permitting.

• Before commencing the experiment, the team double-checked every instrument.

Where does commencing come from?

Language of origin: French

This word descends from the Old French verb comencier, meaning 'to begin' or 'to start', which English borrowed in the early 1300s. The French form came in turn from an unrecorded Vulgar Latin verb cominitiare, built from the Latin intensifying prefix com- and the verb initiare, meaning 'to begin' or 'to initiate' (the same root that gives us 'initial' and 'initiate'). The Latin initiare itself rests on initium, literally 'a going in' or 'an entrance', and so 'beginning'. The doubled letters of the prefix and the soft -ce spelling both survive from the French, which is the spelling trap here: the sound is a plain 's', but the letter is a 'c'. In modern English 'commence' carries a slightly more formal flavour than its plain cousin 'begin', which is why it lingers in legal, ceremonial, and official prose.

How the word is built

• com- (intensive, from Latin)
• mence (from initiare: to begin)
• -ing (present participle suffix)