Questions

How to spell questions

9 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce questions

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does questions mean?

1. nounSentences or requests phrased to obtain information or an answer.
2. verbExpresses doubt about something, or asks a person for information.

Questions in a sentence

• noun

  The interviewer prepared a list of difficult questions in advance.

• verb

  The auditor always questions figures that look too neat.

• noun

  Students may submit their questions to the lecturer by email.

• verb

  Nobody questions her honesty after years of careful work.

Where does questions come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb quaerere, which meant 'to seek, to ask, or to inquire'. From its past participle stem came quaestio, a noun meaning 'a seeking' or 'an inquiry', which by extension came to describe a point under investigation. The word travelled into English through Old French as 'question' during the 1200s, keeping both the legal sense of a matter to be examined and the everyday sense of an asked sentence. The same quaerere root quietly powers a whole family of English words, including 'inquire', 'request', 'conquest', and 'quest' itself, all of them carrying the idea of seeking something. The spelling preserves the Latin 'qu' opening and the 'ti' that softens to a 'ch' sound, which is the part writers most often have to remember consciously.

How the word is built

• quest- (from Latin quaerere: to seek, ask)
• -ion (noun-forming suffix)
• -s (plural / third-person verb ending)