expeditious, epedite

(characterized by speed and efficiency, or carried out promptly and efficiently)

Doing something quickly or as fast as possible

If anyone is expeditious about doing anything, it is based on the fact the the feet are not hindered. The Latin word pes (a stem of ped-) means "foot" and ex- means "out of".

Whenever anyone can expedite anything, then the feet are free to move along.

• An expedient is a measure that is adopted to free the feet.
• An expedition consists of a body of people who are sent on an important undertaking.
• Impede means "to tangle the feet", or "to obstruct the feet".

The element ped is a part of many English words; as in the "pedal" of a bicycle or "pedaling" the bike with the feet.

A quadruped has four feet while a centipede has a "hundred feet" (or at least many feet).

Ped may also refer to a foot as a unit of measurement and there are words identified as sesquipedalian which are defined as being "one and a half feet long".

Despite the validity of the information about these Latin peds which has been presented, there are other peds that come from Greek which do not mean "foot" or "feet".

Expedite: to free the foot

Latin expedire is a compound of ex, "out", and pes, pedis, "foot" and means "to free someone caught by the foot" or "to extricate" the foot or feet.

Its past participle expeditus is the source of English expedite, the original meaning of which was "to relieve of impediments" or "to set free", then, figuratively, "to accelerate the process or progress of anything" and "to facilitate" some action or procedure.

See the other word histories here.