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Where Does the Word “Not” Come From?

The way to say “nothing” in Old English was: nāwiht

This is from a contraction of “ne” meaning “not”, “ā” meaning “ever”, and “wiht” meaning a “thing”. So, the word meant something like “never a thing”. 

Now, Old English had something called emphatic negation. This is where two or more negatives don’t cancel out, but instead contribute to the overall negative meaning of a phrase.

So,

Iċ ne ġehȳrde nāwiht.

“I not heard nothing.”

was a grammatical sentence in Old English. 

Overuse of “nāwiht” caused it to weaken in meaning, and it soon became a mandatory addition when negating any verb. Over time, it contracted to “nāht”.

Through a process known as “Jespersen’s Cycle”, the first negative “ne” was eventually phased out, leaving only the “nāht” to mark negative sentences. 

The full evolution of the word was something like: