Legislature

How to spell legislature

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce legislature

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does legislature mean?

1. nounThe official body of people with the power to make and change laws for a country or state.

Legislature in a sentence

• The new tax bill still has to pass the state legislature before it becomes law.

• Members of the legislature debated the housing reforms for three days.

Where does legislature come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word grows from the Latin lex, meaning 'law', whose genitive form legis appears in many legal terms. Alongside it sits the Latin lator, meaning 'one who proposes or carries', which comes from ferre, 'to carry' (its irregular past participle was latus). Put together, a legis lator was literally 'a proposer of a law', and English borrowed legislator directly for the lawmaker. The abstract noun legislature was then coined in the seventeenth century to name the body of such lawmakers, the institution that frames and passes laws. The same lat element that means 'carried' also hides inside words like 'translate' and 'relate', and recognising that buried lat (not 'let') is the key to spelling the awkward middle of legislature correctly.

How the word is built

• legis- (of law, from Latin lex/legis)
• lat (to propose or carry, from latus)
• -ure (noun suffix)