Amite

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A small town in southeastern Louisiana, located in Tangipahoa Parish near the Mississippi border
2. A community in the southeastern part of Louisiana that serves as the seat of Tangipahoa Parish
3. The name of a small Louisiana town in the southeast of the state, not far from the Mississippi line

Etymology: "Amite" is most familiar today as a place name: the Amite River flows through Louisiana and Mississippi, and several towns and counties share the name. The river's name is older than the settlements around it, but its exact origin is not well documented, so it is best treated as uncertain. As a common word, "amite" is an obsolete variant of "amity," meaning friendship or peaceful goodwill between people or nations. Like "amity," it descends from Latin "amicitia," "friendship," from "amicus," "friend," through Old French. The spelling shows how English once wrote the same Latin-derived word in several ways before "amity" became standard.