One Step Now Education

March 27, 2026

covetous

Sometimes I see a word that sets off my sensors, like a trap waiting to spring. I always caution looks can be deceiving. For example, in the PS of last week's investigation, we talked about hyphenating the word co-owner to avoid a double co-owner? Does the veteran or veterinarian? These are the types of things early word studiers I've worked with spot. So let's test out if these thoughts are legit or if we've been fooled again.

In this investigation, you'll learn to use a Fist to Five strategy to see how much background your student has about a word. We'll revisit adjectives and discover a syntactic test for them. In addition we'll visit a reliable derivational suffix and encounter the verbal inflectional paradigm. We'll review what's allowed in a lexical matrix before finally taking a look at the scribal o>.

Meaning

What is this word's meaning and how does the word function?

What does it mean to be covetous? Immediately, I'm taken back to my childhood and memorizing the Ten Commandments:

"Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife."

I may use a Fist to Five strategy to elicit my student's knowledge of a word.

fist-I don't know this word
one finger-I've heard this word.
two fingers-I've heard this word, and I think I know what it means.
three fingers-I know what this word means.
four fingers-I know what this word means, and I can give you a sentence.
five fingers-I could teach someone this word.

Any time my student gives me a one or two, I might try to elicit some of their knowledge. For me it was the Ten Commandments; it might be different for someone else.

The official definition, according to the Collins dictionary, is "a strong desire to possess something, especially if it belongs to another person."

So the commandment is telling us we shouldn't want our neighbor's wife because it belongs to our neighbor. It's not just about the wife, but the sense of possession hasn't aged well in that translation.

I'm reminded of phrases like "keeping up with the Joneses." I think of how when one neighbor mows their lawn, everyone is always out there later that afternoon or the next day. Unfortunately, I'm often the one with the shaggy lawn everyone is staring at the next day. No one coveting my landscaping skills here.

This word has an adjective form. Adjectives can be inflected for degree. In some cases, we do this with the suffixes <-er> and <-est>, as in bigger and biggest. In other cases, as with covetous, we do it with more and most, more covetous and most covetous.

We can also use a syntactic test to determine if the word is functioning as an adjective. A syntactic test may involve a frame where we can situate a word. For adjectives, the following frame may be used:

The X man is very X.

I could substitute my word for either X. The frame works because true adjectives can modify nouns like manand stand alone after linking verbs. If it makes sense, it's likely to be functioning adjectivally.

The tall man is very tall.

Yes, tall is an adjective here.

The kitchen man is very kitchen.

No, kitchen is not an adjective here.

The delivery man is very delivery.

Hmmm...in the first slot, it seems this way. Certainly, delivery is modifying man, but it doesn't make sense in the second slot. We also can't say a man is more delivery or most delivery. Nouns can function adjectivally to modify other nouns. This doesn't make them an adjective per se.

The covetous man is very covetous.

This makes sense, so covetous is functioning as an adjective here.

Structure

What are the elements that make up this word's structure?

I also know covetous is an adjective, because of a morphological test. The suffix <-ous> reliably forms adjectives. Take a look at these words:

jealous
nervous
ambitious
curious
ambiguous
delicous
serious

Each of these words are adjectives ending in <-ous>. This suffix is one of the first derivational suffixes I teach. Derivational suffixes are suffixes which create new forms. For instance we take the noun nerve and add the <-ous> suffix to create the adjective nervous. I often will teach this one shortly after <-ion>, another common derivational suffix, because it frequently appears in the English language.

Based on that potential <-ous> suffix, our hypothesis is:

covet + ous

But what about that

Jumping to the entry for covet in Etymonline, we see this word has been with us since the Middle Ages. As with many words from the Middle Ages, there is a journey through French. It says the word is ultimately from Latin cupiditas, which itself comes from Latin verb cupere, "desire."

So shouldn't our base be cup> after removing the Latin infinitive suffix <-ere>? Yes, if the word came directly from Latin, but remember that journey through French. It appears during that time, the word got a bit of a makeover. We now have an

covet + ous

Relatives

What are the word's relatives and history?

That brings us to some interesting etymological connections, but first let's look out for words to join our lexical matrix. A lexical matrix is a graphic display of the elements in the words of a particular word family. In this case, the family of cupere.

Since covet is a verb, it includes words derived from the inflectional verbal paradigm. The paradigm consists of words we form with third person singular <-s>, past tense <-ed>, and suffix <-ing>. It may also include participle forms of <-en>. So we can add covets, coveted, and coveting to our matrix. Unfortunately, not a large matrix for

However, that connection to Latin cupere gives us etymological connections that we can include in an etymological circle we might draw around this matrix. Relatives that have more distant ancestors like cuperecould go inside our circle even if they don't fit in the matrix. Think of morphological relatives as brothers and sisters and etymological relatives as your extended family, your cousins from your parents siblings.

That includes the word concupiscence, a word that has also been with us since the Middle Ages regarding a "lustful feeling." We can also include a reference to the god Cupid, whom we often think of in relation to love and Valentine's Day.

Graphemes

What can the pronunciation of the word teach us about the relationship of its graphemes and its phonology?

When we think of the grapheme-phoneme correspondences in this word, we might wonder about spelling the first vowel sound with an come, some, and mother. There are many reasons why this occurs in English, including what some call the "scribal ."

In the Middle Ages, scribes copied books by hand, given that the printing press didn't come around until the end of this time period. In the handwriting of the time, the often bore a resemblance to other letters like love and above.

Another challenging place where students might misspell covetous is with the second syllable. This syllable is unstressed and pronounced as schwa. Since a schwa may be pronounced with any vowel, it can be confusing to know which grapheme represents it. Some students may spell it as *covit.

Next Steps

What concepts from this investigation can we explore next to learn more about the English orthographic system?

The scribal o> is just one more example of how English represents meaning and not just sounds. I certainly do not covet the long hours medieval scribes must have spent hand-copying the Bible and other long manuscripts. However, I always enjoy the stories we find when we investigate words.

Stay curious,

Brad

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Into Practice: Adapting for Beginning Students

Perhaps covetous is a bit too sophisticated for your student. However, there are many words that are also spelled with a "scribal

With come, we can still look at inflectional suffixes with coming and comes (and talk about why came wouldn't go in the matrix). You can also look at derivatives of become, like unbecoming. Even welcome would work. The

Other words with a scribal

P.S. The Fist to Five is a quick informal strategy that can be used for any concept, not just vocabulary. If you want more strategies like this to use in your work with students, then join the class I teach with Dr. Jen Petrich, Connecting the D.O.T.S. You can sign up here.

P.P.S. Many of the adjectives that end in <-ous> have bound bases, unlike the example of nervous we gave above, so make sure your students are familiar with bound bases and Latin origins before heading in that direction. For instance, when you remove <-ous> from jealous, you are left with jeal, which isn't a word in English. However, it does connect to zeal which is a word in our language. Take a look at their relationship. ​