nay
/neɪ/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.43 in modern English
6
Scrabble Score
3
Letters
1
Syllables
3
Unique Chars
Meaning
adv
No.
Archaic
adv
Or rather, or should I say; moreover (introducing a stronger and more appropriate expression than the preceding one).
Archaic
intj
No.
Archaic
Example Sentences
- "Duke Magnus, Duke Magnus, plight thee to me, I pray you still so freely; Say me not nay, but yes, yes!"
- "Nay, what are you smiling at so damnably?"
- "His face was dirty, nay, filthy."
- "[…] And proved not only horse, but cows, / Nay pigs, were of the elder house: / For beasts, when man was but a piece / Of earth himself, did th' earth possess."
- "And even in our wildest and most wandering reveries, nay in our very dreams, we shall find, if we reflect, that the imagination ran not altogether at adventures,"
- "And all rejected: Has this course been used? Arch. We grant it has not; but— King. Nay, give me leave,— I urge, from your own grant, it has not been. If then, in process of a petty sum, Both parties having not been fully heard,[…]"
Etymology
From Middle English nai, nei, from Old Norse nei (“no”), contraction of ne (“not”) + ei (“ever”), itself from Proto-Germanic *nai (“never”), *nē (“not”). More at no. The verb is from Middle English nayen (“to refuse, deny, gainsay”), from the interjection and adverb above.