Etymology

unwanted

U1N1W4A1N1T1E1D2

Today it means: Not wanted; unwelcome. Full definition →

English wanted ← Middle English wanten ← Old Norse vanta
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*né
  2. Proto-Indo-European*n̥-
  3. Proto-Germanic*un-
  4. Proto-West Germanic*un-
  5. Old Englishun-
  6. Middle Englishun-
  7. Englishun-
  8. Proto-Germanic*wanatōną
  9. Old Norsevanta
  10. Middle Englishwanten
  11. Englishwant
  12. Englishwanted
  13. English todayunwanted

From un- + wanted.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.