Gecynde

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Describing something that is natural or inborn, belonging to a thing by its own original character and order
2. Referring to what is innate or native to a being, arising from its own nature rather than from outside influence
3. Characterizing a quality that is inherent and proper to a thing, as it was understood in Old English writing

Etymology: Gecynde is an Old English adjective meaning "natural" or "inherent in nature," and it is the past participle of "gecyndan," "to bring into being, to beget." Its root is "cynd," "nature, kind, race," which is cognate with modern "kind" and with "kin." So a thing that is gecynde is, literally, something that has been brought forth in its proper kind, something born to its nature. The word also reveals how the Anglo-Saxons thought about the world: "kind" once meant both "type" and "origin," and the same idea lies behind "kindred" and "kinship." An Old English speaker calling a creature gecynde was saying it behaved as its birth had made it, not as someone had trained it to. Gecynde does not survive in modern English. Its descendants are the older, looser senses of "kind" and "kindly," which still carry traces of that sense of innate nature.

Synonyms: natural, innate, native

Antonyms: unnatural, artificial