puzzlement

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a state or feeling of confusion caused by being unable to understand something

   Cloudy puzzlement spread across their faces when the locked door opened by itself.

2. 2
   noun

   a thing or situation that is difficult to explain or understand

   The missing page remained a puzzlement to every researcher who examined the manuscript.

Formed in English from puzzle + -ment. The suffix first names the state of being puzzled and, by extension, can name something that produces that state.

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