Propagate

How to spell propagate

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce propagate

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does propagate mean?

1. verbTo breed or multiply plants or organisms, or to cause them to reproduce.
2. verbTo spread an idea, signal, or condition more widely.

Propagate in a sentence

• Gardeners often propagate herbs by rooting small cuttings in water.

• Social media can propagate a rumour across the country within hours.

• These strawberries propagate quickly once their runners reach soil.

• Thick walls weaken the signal as it tries to propagate through the building.

Where does propagate come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word comes from the Latin verb propagare, which meant 'to multiply plants by layering or taking cuttings'. It was built on the noun propago, meaning a young shoot or slip that gardeners pegged into the soil so it would take root, and that in turn traces back to pangere, 'to fasten or fix in place'. The literal image, then, is of pinning a living stem down so it grows into a new plant. English adopted the word in the 1500s, first in this gardening sense, and it soon broadened to mean spreading or multiplying anything, from a family line to a rumour to a radio signal. A useful spelling cue is that single 'g' followed by the soft sounding -ate: the root is propag-, never 'propog-', so the unstressed middle vowel is an 'a', echoing the original propago.

How the word is built

• propag- (from Latin propago: a cutting or slip for planting)
• -ate (verb suffix)