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prefix
Un-  pref.  An inseparable verbal prefix or particle. It is prefixed:
(a)
To verbs to express the contrary, and not the simple negative, of the action of the verb to which it is prefixed; as in unbend, uncoil, undo, unfold.
(b)
To nouns to form verbs expressing privation of the thing, quality, or state expressed by the noun, or separation from it; as in unchild, unsex. Sometimes particles and participial adjectives formed with this prefix coincide in form with compounds of the negative prefix un- (see 2d Un-); as in undone (from undo), meaning unfastened, ruined; and undone (from 2d un- and done) meaning not done, not finished. Un- is sometimes used with an intensive force merely; as in unloose. Note: Compounds of this prefix are given in full in their proper order in the Vocabulary.



Un-  pref.  An inseparable prefix, or particle, signifying not; in-; non-. In- is prefixed mostly to words of Latin origin, or else to words formed by Latin suffixes; un- is of much wider application, and is attached at will to almost any adjective, or participle used adjectively, or adverb, from which it may be desired to form a corresponding negative adjective or adverb, and is also, but less freely, prefixed to nouns. Un- sometimes has merely an intensive force; as in unmerciless, unremorseless.
(a)
Un- is prefixed to adjectives, or to words used adjectively. Specifically:
(b)
To adjectives, to denote the absence of the quality designated by the adjective; as,






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Un-" Quotes from Famous Books



... work. Each observer at the telescopes gave a furtive glance at the un-sunlike sun, moved the dark eye-piece from the instrument, replaced it by a more powerful white glass, and prepared to see all that could be seen in two minutes forty seconds. They must note the shape of the corona, its color, its seeming substance, and they must look ...
— Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals • Maria Mitchell

... helplessly upon the scenery, because it was what we professedly went up or half up, or one-tenth or-hundredth up, the mountain for. Un-professedly we went up in order to come down by the toboggan of the country, though we vowed one another not to attempt anything so mad. In the meanwhile, before it should be time for lunch, we could walk up to a small church near the station and see the people at prayer in an interior which ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells

... broad are his gaskins! how "well let down" he is! What great hocks he has! But, alas I as you view him from behind, you cannot help noticing that his hindlegs incline a little outwards, even as a cow's do—they are not absolutely straight, as they should be. Then as to his golden, un-docked tail: he carries it well—a fact which adds twenty pounds to his value; but, strange to say, it is not "well set on," as a thoroughbred's ought to be. He does not show the quality he ought in his hindquarters. Still his head, neck and crest are good, though ...
— A Cotswold Village • J. Arthur Gibbs

... purpose, That since the Major part of Chymists Credit, what those they call Philosophers affirme of their Stone, I may represent to them, that though when Common Gold and Lead are mingled Together, the Lead may be sever'd almost un-alter'd from the Gold; yet if instead of Gold a Tantillum of the Red Elixir be mingled with the Saturn, their Union will be so indissoluble in the perfect Gold that will be produc'd by it, that there is no known, nor perhaps no possible way of separating the diffus'd ...
— The Sceptical Chymist • Robert Boyle

... follow, because the audience was charmed, and overflowed with expressions of delight, that it therefore agreed. When an orator calls the French Revolution "the greatest, the most un-mixed, the most unstained and wholly perfect blessing Europe has had in modern times, unless, perhaps, we may possibly except the Reformation," there will be those who differ—who will grant the beneficent results of revolutions, ...
— From the Easy Chair, vol. 1 • George William Curtis


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