Recreate

How to spell recreate

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce recreate

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does recreate mean?

1. verbTo make or produce something again, or to reproduce a previous event or scene in detail.

Recreate in a sentence

• The museum hired artists to recreate the lost mural from old photographs.

• Investigators tried to recreate the exact conditions of the accident.

Where does recreate come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This verb traces back to the Latin recreare, formed from the prefix re-, meaning 'again', and creare, meaning 'to bring forth' or 'to produce'. In classical Latin recreare literally meant 'to make anew' but quickly took on the warmer sense of 'to refresh' or 'to restore to health', the idea being that rest and pleasure remake a tired person. English borrowed it in the late 1300s, and over time the spelling carried two distinct lives: a stressed-first 'recreate' meaning to relax or amuse oneself, and a stressed-later 're-create' meaning to produce something again. The same creare root sits inside everyday relatives such as 'create', 'creature', and 'recreation'. Because the prefix re- is added cleanly to the whole word create, the spelling keeps both c letters together and never doubles a consonant, which is the easiest way to remember it.

How the word is built

• re- (again)
• creat (from creare: to bring forth, produce)
• -e (verb)