English
reagent
Reagent may come from Latin reagō ‘to act upon again, to do again’.
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEreagō‘to act upon again, to do again’uncertain
- Englishtodayreagent
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
Earlier history uncertain.
Lineage
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEreagō‘to act upon again, to do again’uncertain
- Englishtodayreagent
The story
The sequence of act → action → agent → agency shows morphologic and semantic parallel, and apparent cognate relation, with react → reaction → reagent → reagency.
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *h₂eǵ-
suggest, register, essay, acre, gesture, digest, congestion, agrarian, progesterone, gestation, ingestion, ingest, axiomatic, agitate, belligerent, samaj, gestion, gerund, agger, 129 more
through Proto-Indo-European *h₂éǵeti ‘to be driving’
strategy, agony, axiom, antagonist, agonist, antagonism, antagonize, glucagon, stratagem, agonize, 103 more
through Proto-Italic *agō ‘to drive’
reaction, actively, transaction, radioactive, inactive, unambiguous, hyperactivity, retroactive, ambiguously, 80 more
through Latin agō ‘do’
act, action, active, activity, actual, actor, examination, agency, examine, activate, agenda, ambiguous, squat, ambiguity, assay, enact, agile, agility, agitation, radium, actuator, actuation, inexact, actuate, cogent, redact, exigent, 96 more
through Latin reagō ‘to act upon again, to do again’
Today it means
noun A compound or mixture of compounds used to treat or test materials, samples, other compounds or reactants in a laboratory or sometimes an industrial setting.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Latin reagō / reagent