Link Centre Dictionary

not

UK/nɒt/ US/nɔt/ very common informal slang

adverb

1.

negation of a word or group of words

  • “he does not speak French”
  • “she is not going”
  • “they are not friends”
  • “not many”
  • “not much”
  • “not at all”

Origin

From Middle English not, nat, a variant of noght, naht (“not, nothing”), from Old English *nōht, nāht (“nought, nothing”), shortening of nōwiht, nāwiht (“nothing”, literally “not anything”), from Proto-West Germanic *naiwwiht, corresponding to ne (“not”) + ōwiht, āwiht (“anything”), corresponding to ā (“ever, always”) + wiht (“thing, creature”).

Phrases

  • could not get elected dogcatcher
  • not a word
  • not again
  • not dog
  • not necessarily
  • not to put too fine a point on it

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.