165: interrogate, arrogant, derogatory, surrogate, prerogative May 22, 2015

What do 'interrogate', 'arrogant', 'derogatory', 'surrogate' and 'prerogative' have in common‽ They all derive from the word 'rogare', meaning 'to ask' in Latin. 'Interrogate' should be self evident, but how did the other words come to mean what they do today‽ In short: prefixes. 'Arrogant' comes from 'ad', meaning 'to' and 'rogare', which later became a verb of its own, 'arrogare' which meant, "claiming for oneself". 'Derogatory' comes from 'de-' which means 'about' but later 'derogare'. 'Surogate' came from 'super' meaning 'above' which later became a separate verb 'surrogare' meaning "elect as substitute". 'Prerogative' comes from 'prae' which meant ‘before’ and ‘ask and meant ‘asked first’, originally denoting the class of people who were first asked to vote.