The verb 'suggest' entered English in the early 16th century from Latin suggest-, the past participle stem of suggerere, meaning 'to bring up, supply, hint'. This Latin term is itself a compound of sub- 'up from below' and gerere 'to bring, carry'. The literal sense of 'carrying up' evolved metaphorically into the act of bringing an idea forward for consideration. Over time, the meaning broadened from a deliberate proposal to also include the more subtle act of causing an idea or impression to arise in the mind, which is its dominant modern sense.

The word is a simplex borrowing from Latin. It cannot be meaningfully segmented into morphemes that are direct substrings of its modern English spelling while retaining clear, independent senses.