remittance n.

late 14c., remitten, "to forgive, pardon," from Latin remittere "send back, slacken, let go back, abate," from re- "back" (see re-) + mittere "to send" (see mission). Secondary senses predominate in English.

From c. 1400 as "refer for consideration or performance from one person or group to another;" early 15c. as "send to prison or back to prison." The meaning "allow to remain unpaid, refrain from exacting" (penalty, punishment, etc.) is from mid-15c. Meaning "send money (to someone) in payment" is recorded from 1630s. Related: Remitted; remitting.

word-forming element attached to verbs to form abstract nouns of process or fact (convergence from converge), or of state or quality (absence from absent); ultimately from Latin -antia and -entia, which depended on the vowel in the stem word, from PIE *-nt-, adjectival suffix.

Latin present-participle endings for verbs stems in -a- were distinguished from those in -i- and -e-. Hence Modern English protestant, opponent, obedient from Latin protestare, opponere, obedire.

As Old French evolved from Latin, these were leveled to -ance, but later French borrowings from Latin (some of them subsequently passed to English) used the appropriate Latin form of the ending, as did words borrowed by English directly from Latin (diligence,absence).

English thus inherited a confused mass of words from French (crescent/croissant), and further confused it since c. 1500 by restoring -ence selectively in some forms of these words to conform with Latin. Thus dependant, but independence, etc.