English Explanatory Dictionary

nought

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. Nothing; something which does not exist.
  2. A thing or person of no worth or value; nil.
  3. Not any quantity of number; zero; the score of no points in a game.
  4. The figure or character representing, or having the shape of, zero.
adj
  1. Good for nothing; worthless.
  2. Wicked, immoral.
verb
  1. To abase, to set at nought.
adv
  1. To no extent; in no way; not at all.
  2. Not.
pron
  1. Nothing; zero.

Pronunciation

/nɔːt/ /noːt/ /nʊt/ /nɔt/ /nɑt/ En-us-nought.ogg /nɒt/

Word forms

nought noughts naught nowt noughting noughted

Etymology

From Middle English nought, noght, noȝt, from Old English nōwiht, nāwiht, which in turn comes from ne-ā-wiht, which was a phrase used as an emphatic "no", meaning "not anything". Equivalent to ne + ought or ne + a + wight. Doublet of naught and not.

Synonyms

good-for-naught no good valueless bastardly blown cacky chaffy cocking crapalicious cruddy cullionly draffish draffy dreckish drecky duffing floccinaucinihilipilificatious for the birds fucking garbagey good-for-nothing goodless ineffectual invaluable jabberwocky junky mouldy mucid naughty no-account no good / no-good nonvaluable not worth a damn not worth a dime not worth a plug nickel not worth a brass farthing not worth a cent not worth a cress not worth a curse not worth a Continental not worth a farthing not worth hell room not worth a nickel not worth a penny not worth salt not worth a whistle nought of no value pissass punk putid rubbishly rubbishy sixpenny scabbed screwy scummy shand shit shitey

Related words

naught ought

Derived words

all for nought bring to nought come to nought dreadnought more often than nought noughth noughties noughty set at nought
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
Back to search All on N Russian dictionary Dahl dictionary