| 释义 |
-ful -fulsuff.1. a. Full of: playful.b. Characterized by; resembling: masterful.c. Tending, given, or able to: useful.2. A quantity that fills: armful.
[Middle English, from Old English, from full, full; see full1.]-ful suffix 1. (forming adjectives) full of or characterized by: painful; spiteful; restful. 2. (forming adjectives) able or tending to: helpful; useful. 3. (forming nouns) indicating as much as will fill the thing specified: mouthful; spoonful. [Old English -ful, -full, from full1] Usage: Where the amount held by a spoon, etc, is used as a rough unit of measurement, the correct form is spoonful, etc: take a spoonful of this medicine every day. Spoon full is used in a sentence such as he held out a spoon full of dark liquid, where full of describes the spoon. A plural form such as spoonfuls is preferred by many speakers and writers to spoonsful-ful a suffix meaning “full of,” “characterized by” (beautiful; careful); “tending to,” “able to” (harmful; wakeful); “as much as will fill” (spoonful). [Middle English, Old English -full, -ful, representing full, ful full1] usage: The plurals of nouns ending in -ful are usu. formed by adding -s to the suffix: two cupfuls. Perhaps influenced by the phrase in which a noun is followed by the adjective full (both arms full of packages), some speakers and writers pluralize such nouns by adding -s before the suffix: two cupsful. |