§239. Names of Actions and Abstract Nouns
Nouns denoting acts, or means and results of acts, are formed from roots or verb-stems by the use of the suffixes—
-men, N.; -mentum, N.; -mōnium, N.; -mōnia, F.
| ag-men, line of march, band; | AG, root of agere, to lead. |
| regi-men, rule; regi-mentum, rule; | regi- (rege-), stem of regere, to direct. |
| certā-men, contest, battle; | certā-, stem of certāre, to contend. |
So
| colu-men, pillar; mō-men, movement; | nō-men, name; flū-men, stream. |
| testi-mōnium, testimony; | testārī, to witness. |
| queri-mōnia, complaint; | querī, to complain. |
-mōnium and -mōnia are also used as secondary, forming nouns from other nouns and from adjectives: as, sāncti-mōnia, sanctity (sānctus, holy); mātrimōnium, marriage (māter, mother.)
(stem almo-), fostering; Almōn, a river near Rome; alimōnia, support. But the last was formed directly from alō when -mōnia had become established as a supposed primary suffix.
J. H. Allen and J. B. Greenough, New Latin Grammar (Boston: Ginn, 1903). Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities.