-ty and -ness

-ty and -ness

Most English adjectives can form nouns by adding the active (originally Old English) suffix -ness, and these nouns denote either a state or quality (cleverness, happiness) or an instance of a state or quality (a kindness). The suffix -ty (often in the form -ity) represents via Old French a Latin noun ending -tas or -itas, and is very common in English (e.g. honesty, notoriety, prosperity, sanity, stupidity); some forms also denote an instance of the quality in the way that some -ness nouns do (an ability, an ambiguity, a curiosity, a fatality, a subtlety, a variety). In most cases parallel nouns in -ness (ableness, curiousness, honestness, etc.) are not normally used, but in other cases a form in -ty has developed a special meaning or a sense of remoteness from the adjective that leaves room for an alternative in -ness, e.g. casualty / casualness, clarity / clearness, crudity / crudeness, enormity / enormousness, ingenuity (from ingenious) / ingenuousness (from ingenuous), nicety / niceness, purity (with sexual overtones) / pureness, preciosity (used of literary or artistic style) / preciousness, speciality / specialness. Some adjectives of Latinate origin that might have been expected to have forms in -ty in fact do not, and -ness forms are used instead, e.g. facetiousness, massiveness, naturalness, seriousness, tediousness. Conversely there are nouns in -ty for which no corresponding adjectives exist in English, e.g. celerity, fidelity, integrity, utility. For other noun forms see -ion, -ment, -ness.