From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishprefixpre‧fix1 /ˈpriːfɪks/ noun [countable] 1 SLG technical a group of letters that is added to the beginning of a word to change its meaning and make a new word, such as ‘un’ in ‘untie’ or ‘mis’ in ‘misunderstand’ → affix, suffix2 a number or letter that comes before other numbers or letters, especially a group of numbers that comes before a telephone number when you are calling someone in a different area3 NAME OF A PERSON old-fashioned a title such as ‘Ms’ or ‘Dr’ used before someone’s name SYN title
Examples from the Corpus
prefix• Confusion is avoided by using the term luminescence, and specifying the activating energy as a descriptive prefix.• These include code reduction functions, prefix and suffix operations, scatter operations and data sorting.• All appear to consist of prefix + stem.• The various lines of dancers took the prefix of the cinema building they were appearing in.• So long as the correct conditions are satisfied any currency can be used with the prefix Euro.• The prefix mono is often dropped.prefixprefix2 verb [transitive] 1 SLGto add a prefix to a word, name, or set of numbers2 formalBEFORE to say something before the main part of what you have to say→ See Verb tableExamples from the Corpus
prefix• All three-digit numbers in Forden will now be prefixed by 580.• It is seldom indeed that such words are prefixed to any declaration in the Bible.• The name of the routine in the defining module interface has an underscore prefixed to the name used in the calling module.• This letter was prefixed to the second volume of Leapor's verse published in 1751.Origin prefix1 (1600-1700) Modern Latin praefixum, from Latin praefigere “to fasten before” prefix2 (1400-1500) Old French prefixer, from fixer “to fix” 