Formative

Definitions

1. A thing which causes formation to occur.
2. A language unit, typically a morph, that has a morphological function (that is, forming a word from a root or another word).
3. Synonym of derivative (“a word that derives from another one”).

Equivalents

Examples

“[T]his museum of the state of flux [Newmarket, Suffolk] has a climate unrivalled for the production of the British temperament. Not without a due proportion of that essential formative of character, east wind, it has at once the hottest sun, the coldest blizzards, the wettest rain⟳, of any place⟳ of its size in 'the three kingdoms.'”

CEFR level