a-

See also Appendix:Variations of "a"

English

Usage notes

Different Germanic senses of a- became confused – vaguely “intensive” – and are no longer productive. The Greek sense of “not” (e.g., amoral) remains productive.

“[I]t naturally happened that all these a- prefixes were at length confusedly lumped together in idea, and the resultant a- looked upon as vaguely intensive, rhetorical, euphonic [nice-sounding], or even archaic, and wholly otiose [pointless].” OED.

Etymology 1

From Old English ā-, originally **ar-, *or-, from Proto-Germanic *uz- (“out-”), from Proto-Indo-European *uds- (“up, out”). Cognate with German er-.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ə/, SAMPA: /@/

Prefix

a-

1. (no longer productive) forming verbs with the sense away, from, out

   arise, await

Etymology 2

A proclitic form of preposition a

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ə/, SAMPA: /@/

Prefix

a-

1. (no longer productive) in, on

   apace, afire, aboil

Etymology 3

From Middle English variant form of y-, from Old English ġe-, from Proto-Germanic *ga-.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ə/, SAMPA: /@/

Prefix

a-

1. (Appalachian) used in the present participle and sometimes past participle.

   They's asinging a song. He's aheaded to the store.

2. (no longer productive) representing the Anglo-Saxon intensifying prefix, sometimes with little change in meaning, e.g. aware
   • 1777, Thomas Arne, A-Hunting We Will Go
   • 1780, The Twelve Days of Christmas:

     The twelfth day of Christmas,

     My true love sent to me

     Twelve lords a-leaping,

     …

     Eight maids a-milking,

     Seven swans a-swimming,

     Six geese a-laying,

   • c. 1850, Here We Come A-wassailing/Here We Come A-caroling

     Here we come a-wassailing

     Among the leaves so green;

     Here we come a-wand’ring

     So fair to be seen.

   • 1939, Alfred Edward Housman, Additional Poems, XIII, lines 6-7:

     Oh waste no words a-wooing

     The soft sleep to your bed;

Usage notes

Beyond its use it a few words such as aware (which has replaced the plain ware), common use of this prefix is fossilized in a few songs, as listed above, and its productive use is considered highly archaic or poetic. It remains in use in Appalachian English.

Etymology 4

From Anglo-Norman a-, from Old French e-, from Latin ex-.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ə/, SAMPA: /@/

Prefix

a-

1. (no longer productive) forming words with the sense of wholly, out, e.g. abash

Etymology 5

From Ancient Greek ἀ- (a-) (ἀν- (an-) immediately preceding a vowel).

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ə/, /eɪ/, SAMPA: /@/, /eI/

Prefix

a-

1. Forming words denoting absence or lack, e.g. abyss, amoral, usually with stems beginning with consonants.
   • 1948 (revised 1952), Robert Graves, The White Goddess, Faber & Faber 1999, p. 7:

     When invited to believe in the Chimaera, the horse-centaurs, or the winged horse Pegasus, all of them straightforward Pelasgian cult-symbols, a philosopher felt bound to reject them as a-zoölogical improbabilities [...].

Related terms

• an-

References

• “a-” in the Online Etymology Dictionary, Douglas Harper, 2001

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French

Etymology 1

From Old French, from Latin ad-.

Prefix

a-

1. A prefix forming words, especially verbs, that denote entering a state, making progress toward a goal, or the like.

Etymology 2

From Ancient Greek ἀ- (a-) (ἀν- (an-) immediately preceding a vowel; generalized from the many Latin borrowings using this prefix.

Prefix

a-

1. a-, non-, -less.

References

• "a-" in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

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Italian

Wikipedia ^it

Etymology 1

From Latin ad-.

Prefix

a-

1. ad- (indication direction)

Usage notes

The Italian prefix a- often reduplicates the following consonant (syntactic gemination, raddoppiamento fonosintattico). The actual forms usually will be ab- (in abbracciare), ad- (in addestrare), al- (in allargare) etc.

Etymology 2

Borrowed from Ancient Greek ἀ- (a-).

Prefix

a-

1. a- (indicating lack or loss)

Synonyms

• an-

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Latin

Alternative forms

• ab-, abs-

Etymology

From ab (“away from”)

Prefix

a-

1. from, away, away from
2. off
3. at a distance
4. completely, thoroughly
5. absence of
6. more remote

Usage notes

• used before consonants, but not usually 'c' or 't'.
• before a word beginning with "f," becomes "au-" as in auferre
• before a word beginning with "p," becomes "as-" as in asportare

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Navajo

Prefix

a-

1. someone's, people's

Usage notes

This prefix is often used as a neutral possessive pronoun to make the citation forms of inalienable nouns: amá (“someone's mother”), akʼos (“someone's neck”), ajáád (“someone's leg”), ajááʼ (“someone's ear”), akʼéí (“someone's kin”). The alternative is to use the prefix bi- (“his/her/its/their”) to make these dictionary forms.

See also

• shi-
• ni-
• bi-
• yi-
• ha-
• á-
• nihi-
• ał-
• ahił-

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Old English

Etymology

From an earlier form ar-, from Germanic. Cognate with Old High German ar-, ir- (German er-).

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ɑː/

Prefix

ā-

1. forming words with the sense from, away, off, out, e.g. āniman

Derived terms

• Category:Old English words prefixed with a-

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Old French

Etymology

Latin ad, which was often reduced to a- in compounds.

Prefix

a-

1. indicating movement towards something
2. (by extension) indicating a change of state

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Polish

Etymology

From an indoslavic form अ-.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ɑː/

Prefix

a-

1. forming words with the sense of negation, eg. aspołeczny (a- + społeczny)

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Serbo-Croatian

Etymology

From Ancient Greek ἀ- (a-) (ἀν- (an-) immediately preceding a vowel).

Prefix

a- (Cyrillic spelling а-)

1. Prefix prepended to words to denote a negation, deprivation or absence of a property denoted by base word.

   • a- + socijalan → asocijalan
   • a- + simetrija → asimetrija
   • a- + brahija → abrahija

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Spanish

Etymology 1

From Latin ad-.

Prefix

a-

1. A prefix forming words, especially verbs, that denote entering a state, making progress toward a goal, or the like.

See also

• en-

Etymology 2

From Ancient Greek ἀ- (a-) (ἀν- (an-) immediately preceding a vowel; generalized from the many Latin borrowings using this prefix.

Prefix

a-

1. a-, non-, -less.