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Manifesto Has Latin Roots
Manifesto is related to manifest, which occurs in English as a noun, verb, and adjective. Of these, the adjective, which means "readily perceived by the senses," is oldest, dating to the 14th century. Both manifest and manifesto derive ultimately from the Latin noun manus ("hand") and -festus, a combining form of uncertain meaning that is also found in the Latin adjective infestus ("hostile"), an ancestor of the English infest. Something that is manifest is easy to perceive or recognize, and a manifesto is a statement in which someone makes his or her intentions or views easy for people to ascertain. Perhaps the most well-known statement of this sort is the Communist Manifesto, written in 1848 by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels to outline the platform of the Communist League.
Examples of manifesto in a Sentence
Ben Smith, semafor.com, 18 July 2025
The Labour Party promised to lower the voting age to include 16 and 17-year-olds in its 2024 manifesto.
—Timothy Nerozzi, The Washington Examiner, 17 July 2025
His motive remains unknown and no manifesto has been found.
—Yahya Abou-Ghazala, CNN Money, 30 June 2025
The suspect in the killing, 26-year-old Luigi Mangione, wrote a manifesto blasting the industry, according to investigators.
—Joseph Wilkinson, New York Daily News, 25 June 2025
Gendron’s manifesto discusses how he was radicalized on the dark web and inspired to attack after watching videos of Brenton Tarrant’s 2019 massacre of 51 people at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand.
—Alex Hinton, The Conversation, 17 June 2025
The manifesto must have struck a chord because Marbeck, who had only starred in a couple of shorts before, pulls off an impressive performance as Godard, down to his unique way of speaking and mannerism.
—Elsa Keslassy, Variety, 30 June 2025
Her recent YouTube video doubles as both a progress report and a manifesto.
—Melissa Fleur Afshar, MSNBC Newsweek, 16 June 2025
So how might the author of that manifesto criticize this play?
—Helen Shaw, New Yorker, 26 June 2025
Cite this Entry
“Manifesto.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/manifesto. Accessed 8 Aug. 2025.
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