Some

Part of speech: determiner, pronoun

Pronunciation: /sʌm/

Definitions

1. An unspecified quantity or number of items that is not defined
2. A portion of things that does not have a precise value and can encompass various amounts
3. Refers to an amount or number that is not exactly specified or counted

Etymology: The word has been in English for a very long time. It comes from Old English "sum," meaning "some" or "a certain one," and it passed down through Middle English "som" and "sum" with little fundamental change. Its roots run back to a Proto-Germanic form, "sumaz," which carried the same sense of an indefinite, unnamed portion of a larger whole. Its ancestry reaches further still, to a Proto-Indo-European root, "sem-," meaning "one" or "whole." That makes "some" a relative of the idea of unity: a particular unit picked out from a group. The same root gave rise to the number "one" in various related languages, so the word's meaning of "a certain, unnamed one" grew naturally from a sense of singleness. The word's close relatives are spread across the Germanic family. Scots "sum," Dutch "sommige," German dialect "summige," Danish "somme," Swedish "somlig," and Icelandic "sumur" all carry the same meaning, and the Gothic "sums" meant "one" or "someone," showing that the sense of an indefinite single member was already present in the earliest recorded Germanic languages.

Synonyms: several, few

Antonyms: none