-phone
(fəʊn)
ad. Gr. ϕων-ή voice, ϕῶν-ος sounding.
1. Used in the sense ‘sound’ in the names of various instruments (scientific and musical), as gramophone, magnetophone, megaphone, mellophone, microphone, vibraphone.
2. Used in the sense ‘speaker of’ or ‘-speaking’ in the formation of nouns and adjectives from Latinate combining forms of names of peoples and languages, as Anglophone, Bulgarophone, francophone n. and a., Turcophone.
| 1900 Anglophone [see francophone n. and a.]. 1937 Bulgarophone [see Exarchist]. 1977 Times Litt. Suppl. 18 Mar. 295/5 His description of Turcophones in Iran (of whom he is one) as a ‘nation’. |