Alpha privative

An alpha privative or, rarely, privative a (from Latinalpha prīvātīvum, from Ancient Greekα στερητικόν) is the prefixa- or an- (before vowels) that is used in Indo-European languages such as Sanskrit and Greek and in words borrowed therefrom to express negation or absence, for example the English words of Greek origin , , and , as well as the English word of Sanskrit origin ahimsa (ahinsa).

It is derived from a Proto-Indo-European syllabic nasal *n̥-, the zero ablaut grade of the negation *ne, i.e. /n/ used as a vowel. For this reason, it usually appears as an- before vowels (e.g. an-alphabetism, an-esthesia, an-archy). It shares the same root with the Greek prefix nē- or ne-, in Greek νη- or νε-, that is also privative (e.g. ne-penthe).

It is not to be confused with, among other things, an alpha copulative (e.g. ) or the prefix an- (i.e. the preposition aná with or elision of its final vowel before a following vowel; e.g. an-ode).