Ancestors

Written by Yoïn van Spijk on 2025-01-15 at 17:55

The English words 'no' and 'no' don't share a common ancestor. 'No', the opposite of 'yes', comes from Proto-West-Germanic *naiw (never), while 'no' as in 'no pain, no gain' comes from *nain (not any): it arose as a variant of 'none'.

'No' as opposed to 'yes' isn't related to German 'nein' and Dutch 'nee' either. Their only common part is 'n-', which comes from the Germanic negation particle *ne, also found in words such as 'not', 'neither' and 'never'.

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Written by P. S. F. on 2025-01-15 at 18:28

@yvanspijk I was wondering if the "no/non"* in romance languages are related to any of those words or if it is not related at all 🤔

• As opposed to "yes"

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Toot

Written by Yoïn van Spijk on 2025-01-15 at 18:31

@prsfalken They are! They come from Latin 'nōn', from Old Latin 'noinom', which is 'ne' + 'oinom', literally "not one". So it's parallel to Proto-Germanic *nainan, which became German 'nein', Dutch 'nee' etc.

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Descendants