Perpetuate

How to spell perpetuate

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce perpetuate

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does perpetuate mean?

1. verbTo cause something, especially a situation, belief, or custom, to continue indefinitely.

Perpetuate in a sentence

• Lazy hiring practices only perpetuate the same old inequalities.

• The documentary aims to challenge the myths that newspapers perpetuate.

Where does perpetuate come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This verb comes from the Latin perpetuare, meaning 'to make continuous' or 'to cause to last forever'. It was built on the adjective perpetuus, 'unbroken, continuous', which in turn traces back to perpes, formed from per- 'through' and petere 'to seek or go toward', so the underlying image is of something that keeps going onward without stopping. English adopted it in the early 1500s, already carrying the sense of keeping a state, custom, or memory alive over time. The same petere root surfaces in a surprising family of English words, including 'petition', 'appetite', and 'compete', all of which involve seeking or striving toward something. The spelling trap lives in the unstressed middle: writers hear 'per-PET-choo-ate' and can drop the second 'e' or mishandle the '-uate' ending, so remembering the link to 'perpetual' helps keep the letters in order.

How the word is built

• per- (through, continuously)
• petu (from Latin petere: to seek, to go toward)
• -ate (verb-forming suffix)