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In Greek, what does the suffix -or mean?
–tōr is an agent suffix:
Herbert Weir Smyth, A Greek Grammar for Colleges (misscanned)
a. The primary suffixes τᾱ, τηρ, τορ, τρο, ευ, denoting the agent or doer of an action, are masculine.
…
3. τορ (nom. -τωρ): ῥή-τωρ orator (ἐρέω shall say, ἐρ-, ῥε-), εἴ-ρη-κα have spoken, κτίσ-τωρ founder (κτίζω found, κτιδ-), σημάντωρ commander poet. (σημαίνω give a signal, σημαν-).
-τωρ and its Latin cognate -tor (e.g. gladita-tor, domina-tor, can-tor), is an Indo-European suffix.
[Originally posted on http://quora.com/In-Greek-what-does-the-suffix-or-mean/answer/Nick-Nicholas-5]
It’s also both the agent suffix and the agent preposition in Voksigid. I remember speculating on the meaning of homotor (the agent of the stative verb ‘be human’) on the Conlang list. Who is it who makes us human? God?
In colloquial Greek, and for that matter in formal English (“make one human”), that is the function of an educator, or a mentor.
But those are not stative verbs.
Make you human = make you be-human: not much of a stretch.
Babies are quite human. You’ll see.