Indicate

How to spell indicate

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce indicate

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does indicate mean?

1. verbTo point out, show, or make something clear, often as a sign or signal.

Indicate in a sentence

• The survey results clearly indicate a drop in customer satisfaction.

• Please indicate on the form which payment method you prefer.

Where does indicate come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word comes from the Latin verb indicare, meaning 'to point out' or 'to make known', which was built from the prefix in-, here carrying the sense 'towards', and dicare, 'to proclaim or declare'. That dicare belongs to the wider family of dicere, 'to say', which also gave English such relatives as 'dictate', 'verdict' and 'index', the latter literally being the pointing finger. English adopted indicate in the early 1600s, taking it from the Latin past participle stem indicat-, and the meaning stayed close to the original idea of pointing something out or showing it clearly. The spelling is reassuringly regular for a Latin borrowing: the steady -ic- root and the familiar -ate ending mean the chief uncertainty is simply remembering it ends in -ate rather than -ait.

How the word is built

• in- (towards)
• dic (from dicere: to point out, to say)
• -ate (verb suffix)