Meanings
- datedUsed to form present participles and verbal nouns; and, (dialectal) circumfixed to words which function as part of a verb phrase (e.g. “he went a-hunting”)
Bye, baby Bunting, / Father's gone a-hunting, / Mother's gone a-milking, / Sister's gone a-silking, / Brother's gone to buy a skin / To wrap the baby Bunting in.
1951, I. Opie, P. Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, 2nd edition, Oxford University Press, published 1997, page 63
Origin
The a is a reduced form of the preposition on, which was used in Old English with nouns indicating actions or states, e.g. iċ wæs on huntoþe (“I was hunting”). This is the source of such words as asleep and alive, which also show reduction of on to a. In the Middle English period, the preposition came to be used with the present participles of verbs as well (formed in -ing), eventually coming to be perceived as a mere prefix.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
a- -ing. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/a-%20-ing
“a- -ing.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/a-%20-ing. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “a- -ing,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/a-%20-ing.
Source: a- -ing on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.