Traces

How to spell traces

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce traces

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does traces mean?

1. nounVisible marks, signs, or very small remaining quantities of something.
2. verbFinds, follows, or copies something by careful step-by-step study.

Traces in a sentence

• noun

  The lab found traces of lead in the drinking water.

• verb

  The auditor traces every payment back to its original invoice.

• noun

  Faint traces of mud led across the kitchen floor.

• verb

  She carefully traces the outline of the map onto thin paper.

Where does traces come from?

Language of origin: French

This word descends from the Latin verb trahere, which literally meant 'to pull' or 'to drag'. From its past participle came the Vulgar Latin noun tractia, 'something drawn or dragged along', which passed into Old French as 'trace', a track or footprint left behind by something that has moved. English took the word in the 1300s, first for the trail or mark an animal or person leaves, and the meaning later widened to any faint surviving sign or tiny quantity. The same trahere root pulls its weight inside a whole family of English words, including 'tract', 'attract', 'subtract' and 'trail', which is a useful reminder that the spelling keeps the soft 'c' from its French stage. A separate but related sense, the leather straps by which a horse drags a cart, comes from the very same idea of pulling.

How the word is built

• trace (mark, track)
• -s (plural noun / third-person verb ending)