edify

the word 'edify' originates from the latin verb 'aedificare', meaning 'to build, construct'. this verb itself is a compound of 'aedis' (a building, especially a temple) and '-ficare' (a suffix from 'facere', to make). the literal sense of constructing a physical structure was metaphorically extended in late latin and old french to the construction of the mind or character through instruction. this figurative meaning was fully adopted into middle english, where the word came to signify the intellectual or moral improvement of a person, shedding its original concrete association while retaining the core logic of building something up.

Structure: edi (building) + fy (to make) edi (from latin 'aedis', meaning 'building, temple'); fy (from latin '-ficare', a verb-forming suffix meaning 'to make, to do').