-eer
a noun-forming suffix occurring originally in loanwords from french (buccaneer; mutineer; pioneer) and productive in the formation of english nouns denoting persons who produce, handle, or are otherwise significantly -ssociated with the referent of the base word (auctioneer; engineer; mountaineer; pamphleteer); now frequently pejorative (profiteer; racketeer).
compare -ary, -er2 , -ier2 .
-eer
suffix
(forming nouns) indicating a person who is concerned with or who does something specified auctioneer, engineer, profiteer, mutineer
(forming verbs) to be concerned with something specified electioneer
word origin
from old french -ier, from latin -arius-ary
-eer
anglicized form of fr. -ier, from l. -arius, -iarius.
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