without

Meanings

1. 1
   prep

   Not having or not using something.

   They had to eat without forks or spoons.

2. 2
   prep

   Not doing something while doing something else.

   He left the room without saying a word.

3. 3
   adv

   Without the thing that is needed or wanted.

   Money was tight, so he learned to live without.

From Middle English withoute, withouten, from Old English wiþūtan (literally “against the outside of”). Compare Dutch buiten (“outside of, without”), Danish uden (“without”), Swedish utan (“without”), Norwegian uten (“without”). By surface analysis, with- + out. Superseded non-native Middle English sauns, sans (“without”), from Old French sans, sanz, senz (“without”). Compare typologically Proto-Slavic *bez (“without”) (<+ Proto-Indo-European *h₁éǵʰs (“out”)).

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