Premiere, Premium, Premier, Prime
These four words are used very often, but I will never understand their differences. In my often mistaken views, they are the same–meaning something good–but they are used in different occasions.
premiere: the first performance of a musical or theatrical work or the first showing of a movie. The debut of a movie of a show is called the premiere, which is never used on anything else. At least that’s what I know.
premium: 1. an amount to be paid for an insurance policy. 2. a sum added to an ordinary price or charge. For example, “customers are reluctant to pay a premium for organic fruit”. This word is being heard very often, but I think it just means it is better than the regular one. For example, a can of “premium beer” is better than a can of regular beer; a “premium outlet” mall is better than a regular mall, which I have some doubts; something with a “premium quality” is better than others, for example when filling up the gas, the premium is usually better than the regular; a “premium hotel room” is a better room.
premier: first in importance, order, or position; leading. It is also a name for prime minister. I heard it being used on “premier league”, which is a European version of the “major league” in America. That’s my understanding. There are also phrases like “premier qualifying point”, “premier room”, which are probably indicating their better quality than others.
prime: 1. of first importance; main. 2. of the best possible quality; excellent. “prime cuts of meat.” I’ve heard phrases like prime rib, prime time, prime real estate, prime number, prime suspect, prime minister, which all mean “better” or “best”.
Prim, Prime, Primer
prim: stiffly formal and respectable; feeling or showing disapproval of anything regarded as improper. “a very prim and proper lady”
prime: 1. of first importance; main. 2. of the best possible quality; excellent. “prime cuts of meat”
primer: a substance used as a preparatory coat on previously unpainted wood, metal, or canvas, especially to prevent the absorption of subsequent layers of paint or the development of rust. “apply three coats of primer”
Primal, Primodial, Primeval
primal: 1. relating to an early stage in evolutionary development; primeval. “primal hunting societies” 2. essential 3. relating to or denoting the needs, fears, or behavior that are postulated (especially in Freudian theory) to form the origins of emotional life.
primodial: existing at or from the beginning of time; primeval.
primeval: of or resembling the earliest ages in the history of the world.
Primitive, Primate, Primary, Primacy
primitive: relating to, denoting, or preserving the character of an early stage in the evolutionary or historical development of something. “primitive mammals”
primate: a mammal of an order that includes the lemurs, bushbabies, tarsiers, marmosets, monkeys, apes, and humans.
primary: of chief importance; principal. 2. earliest in time or order.
Primo, Primogeniture, Promo,
primo: 1. (music) the leading or upper part in a duet. 2. (North America) of top quality or importance. “the primo team in the land”
primogeniture: the right of succession belonging to the firstborn child, especially the feudal rule by which the whole real estate of an intestate passed to the eldest son.
promo: a piece of publicity or advertising, especially in the form of a short film or video. “a promo video”
Preempt, Preen
preempt: take action in order to prevent (an anticipated event) from happening; forestall. “the second session will focus on policies to pre-empt problems”
preen: (of a bird) straighten and clean its feathers with its beak. “robins preened at the pool’s edge” 2. (of a person) devote effort to making oneself look attractive and then admire one’s appearance. “adolescents preening in their bedroom mirrors”
Haoyan Do 
Most of the words you wrote are derivatives from the word prime.
I found this on the wikitionary page for the word “prime”. It’s a good place to read about linguistic history and etymology:
Borrowed from French prime, from Latin primus (“first”), from earlier prīsmos < *prīsemos < Proto-Italic *priisemos, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *per- (“beyond, before”). Doublet of primo.
The noun sense "apostrophe-like symbol" originates from the fact that the symbol ′ was originally a superscript Roman numeral one.
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True. Prime is more complicated than I originally thought. Wow, your last line makes me laugh. Numeral one is represented by an apostrophe. That’s so creative. I would never have thought of that.
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A great collection. You really have a knack for putting such words together. This is wonderful sharing. Premium stuff. 🙂
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Yes, trying to make sense out of those confusing word groups.
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Great content! It is nice to revisit these words like this. You are a premier blogger!
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In Canada, Premier is the title given to the person who oversees provincial government workings. They are kind of like a state governor in the USA. You probably saw it in my posts a few times
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I see. So the premier probably means the first person in the province. So Canada is having provinces while America is having states. That’s very interesting. Canada has premier and America has governors. See. The same positions but different names.
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I don’t know why they say Premier. I wouldn’t say it’s exactly the same as state governors though. There are some differences because the provincial system is different from the state system
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Yes, I agree. It must be different.
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So, by way of contrast, here in Australia we have governors as the head of each state that represent the crown (the Queen), with premiers the head of the government. So, the parliament makes the laws, the governor approves the law and the premier administers the law. The judiciary interprets the law.
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I see. I thought Australia has the same name convention as Canada, but now I realize that it’s not exactly. It is very interesting. It is also very interesting that even if these officials are elected to represent the people, they still have the nominal function to represent the crown.
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Great collection of words. By the way, there’s a great British TV series called “Primeval”. 😁
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Wow, that’s such an eccentric name. I wonder what it is. Thanking for sharing. I’ve never encountered this word myself.
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It’s about dangerous dinosaur like and fierce predators coming through “anomalies” from other time and dimensions and a team of British scientists try to get them back to their time. Always trying to keep everything secret from the public. Before the TV series the word was unknown to me as well 😁
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That sounds like a precursor to “Jurassic Park”. That’s a good way to keep an obscure word in use–make a TV series out of it.
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It is a great show 😎
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You piqued my interest 😎
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It was made by the same people who made the documentary series Walking With Dinosaurs. It is very much the ensemble cast, so the stories are not always about the leads and there is plenty of intrigue and interesting inter relationships. The dinosaurs cause havoc based on their characteristics for each species and so there are plenty of challenges managing their impact.
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Hmm. That sounds very interesting. Wish I have watched it. I only know the Jurassic Park Movies1,2,3 and don’t know the rest. I guess Jurassic Park is not the first one about Dinosaurs. So many were before it…
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