aught

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“
"But will you swear by all that you yet hold sacred -- if, alas! there be aught which is sacred to you -- that you will not again seek the company of those men who are conspiring to entrap you into the hangman's hands?"

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Definitions (12)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (4)

  1. pronoun Anything whatever: "Neither of his parents had aught but praise for him” (Louis Auchincloss).
  2. adverb Archaic In any respect; at all.
  3. noun A cipher; zero.
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Examples (50)

  • Avoid doing aught which is displeasing to God to wit deadly sin. —  The Memoirs of the Lord of Joinville
  • Foolish they, for in them is no far-reaching thought, that they should dream that what was not before can be, or that aught which is can utterly perish and die." —  A Short History of Greek Philosophy
  • "You are cau--aught, wretch! —  The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories
  • "I'faith," replied Calandrino, "why, first, first of all, thou wilt tell her that I wish her a thousand bushels of the good seed of generation, and then that I am her servant, and if she is fain of--aught--thou tak'st me?" —  The Decameron, Volume II
  • So was it done In full divan the business had debate And many thought this thing and many that Till there arose an unknown priest who said If life be aught, the savior of a life Owns more the living thing than he can own Who sought to slay--the slayer spoils and wastes The cherisher sustains, give him the bird Which judgment all found just Light of Asia. —  Voices for the Speechless
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Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (5)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (2)

  1. Middle English, from Old English āuht; see aiw- in Indo-European roots.
  2. From an aught, alteration of a naught; see naught.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (3)

  1. In two forms: (1) aught, from Middle English aught, auзht, auht, aght, aзt, aht, from Anglo-Saxon awiht, awuht, with vowel shortened from orig. long, āwiht; (2) ought, from Middle English ought, ouht, oght, oЗt, oht, from Anglo-Saxon āwiht, āwuht, contr. āht, with labialized vowel, ōwiht, ōwuht (= Old Saxon ēowiht = OFries. āwet, āet = Dutch iets = Old High German eowiht, iowiht, iewiht, Middle High German ieht, iht, iewet, iet), from ā, ever, in comp. a generalizing prefix, + wiht, wight, whit, thing: literally ‘ever a whit’: see ay and whit, wight, and cf. the negative naught, nought, ‘never a whit.’ There is no essential difference between the two spellings aught and ought; the former is now preferred.
  2. from Middle English aught, etc.; properly accusative of the noun.
  3. Now only in Scots, written aucht (äċht), from Middle English aught, aughte, auchte, aght, auhte, ahte, etc., from Anglo-Saxon æ¯ht, plural æ¯hta (= Old High German ēht = Gothic (Moesogothic) aihts, property, = Icelandic ætt, family), with formative -t, from āgan (preterit āhte), have, hold, own: see ought and owe.
 

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