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-cle1

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  1. a suffix found in French loanwords of Latin origin, originally diminutive nouns, and later in adaptations of words borrowed directly from Latin or in Neo-Latin coinages: article; conventicle; corpuscle; particle.
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Origin of -cle1

< French, Old French < Latin -culus, -cula, -culum, variant of -ulus -ule with nouns of the 3rd, 4th and 5th declensions, usually with the same gender as the base noun

-cle2

  1. a suffix found in French loanwords of Latin origin, later in adaptations of words borrowed directly from Latin; in Latin, this suffix formed from verbs nouns that denoted a place appropriate to the action of the verb (cubicle, receptacle) or a means by which the action is performed (vehicle).
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Origin of -cle2

< French, Old French < Latin -culum, -cula < *-tlom, *-tlā
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
British Dictionary definitions for -cle

-cle

suffix forming nouns
  1. indicating smallnesscubicle; particle
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Word Origin

via Old French from Latin -culus. See -cule
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012