Remains

How to spell remains

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce remains

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does remains mean?

1. verbContinues to exist, stay in place, or be in a particular state (third person singular).
2. nounThe parts of something that are left over, including ruins, leftovers, or a dead body.

Remains in a sentence

• verb

  The old factory remains empty despite several plans to redevelop it.

• noun

  Archaeologists carefully catalogued the remains of the Roman villa.

• verb

  After all the layoffs, only a small team remains in the office.

• noun

  The remains of the picnic were packed back into the basket.

Where does remains come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb remanere, which meant 'to stay behind' or 'to be left over', built from the prefix re- ('back') and manere ('to stay or remain'). The same manere root underlies a whole family of English words about staying put, including 'mansion' (originally a place to stay), 'permanent' (staying through), and 'manor'. Latin remanere passed into Old French as remaindre and remanoir, and English borrowed it in the 1300s, first as the verb 'remain' meaning 'to continue in the same place or state'. The plural noun sense, meaning what is left over (including a dead body), developed naturally from the idea of things that stay behind once everything else has gone. The single -m- and the plain -ains ending are the spelling points worth fixing in memory, since the root is simply 'main' with 're-' in front.

How the word is built

• re- (back, again)
• main (from Latin manere: to stay)
• -s (plural noun / third-person verb ending)