LATIN DICTIONARYLexicon Latīnum
suffix · masculinethird declension

-or

-or m (genitive -ōris)
Classical[ˈɔr]Ecclesiastical[ˈɔr]

Meaning

  1. masculinemorphemeused to form an abstract noun from a verb root or conceived root form
    amō (“to love”) + -or → amor (“love”)
    timeō (“to fear”, “to be afraid”) + -or → timor (“fear”)
  2. masculinemorphemerareused to form an abstract noun from an adjective
    amārus (“bitter”) + -or → amāror (“bitterness”)

Origins

From Proto-Italic *-ōs, from Proto-Indo-European *-ōs, for original *-oss, compound suffix from *(é)-os (athematic) (neuter s-stem) + *-s (masculine nominative). The ō from the nominative case was made common to all cases originally with non-ablauting o (the three exceptions were arbor, mulier and Cerēs). Afterwards nom.sg. -ōr > -or, by Latin sound laws. Thus paradoxically, as in other r-stems (soror, -tor), in the resulting paradigm the one form with a short stem vowel is the only form whose stem was etymologically long.

Gallo-Romance
  • Catalan-or
  • French-eur
  • Occitan-or
  • Franco-Provençal-or
Ibero-Romance
  • Portuguese-or
  • Spanish-or
Italo-Romance
  • Italian-ore

Quick answers

What does -or mean in Latin?
-or, a suffix, means “used to form an abstract noun from a verb root or conceived root form; used to form an abstract noun from an adjective”.
How do you pronounce -or?
In classical Latin, [ˈɔr]; in ecclesiastical (church) Latin, [ˈɔr].