Nawiht

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An archaic Old English word meaning nothing at all, or a total absence of anything in a particular matter
2. Old English term for naught, used to express that there is no thing, quantity or amount whatsoever
3. A historical form meaning nothing, once used in early English to indicate the complete lack of anything

Etymology: Before it meant zero, Old English "nawiht" meant "not a creature." It was built from "ne" (not), "ā" (ever), and "wiht," a word for a being or thing. Its partner "āwiht," "ever a thing," gave "aught," meaning "anything at all," so the pair ran from "anything" to "not anything." The root "wiht" survives in two modern words. "Wight," now archaic, meant a person, and it still carries a supernatural flavour in fantasy writing. "Whit," as in "not a whit," is the same word narrowed to a tiny particle, so the phrase is a faint echo of the original "not a thing." Over the Middle English period the spelling shifted to "naught" and "nought," and the sense moved from "no being" to "nothing" and then to "zero." That is why "naught" still survives in phrases like "come to naught" and why mathematicians once spoke of "noughts."