Silas (name) Silas (name) Silas is a common given name and a lesser-known surname. It is a cognate of Silvanus. Silas as a name today comes from the early Christian disciple Silas. He is consistently called "Silas" in Acts, but the Latin Silvanus, which means "of the forest," is always used by Paul and in the First Epistle of Peter; it is likely that "Silvanus" is the Romanized version of the original "Silas," or that "Silas" is the Greek nickname for "Silvanus." It has been suggested that Silas is the Greek version of the Aramaic "Seila," a version of the Hebrew "Saul".
English language nominal compounding, producing compound words such as "babysitter" or "ice cream" or "homesick". A process more common in Old English than in Modern English, but still productive in Modern English, is the use of derivational suffixes ("-hood", "-ness", "-ing", "-ility") to derive new words from existing words (especially those of Germanic origin) or stems (especially for words of Latin or Greek origin). Formation of new words, called neologisms, based on Greek and/or Latin roots (for example "television" or "optometry") is a highly productive process in English and in most modern European languages, so much so that it is often difficult