[removed]

Aborigines is Latin for "original inhabitants" and was adopted into mid-17th century English as aborigine. The English named the native people living in Australia aborigines because they were he original inhabitants of Australia (or at least they were there when the British colonized the place).

Ab- means from. It's a different prefix than a-. Ab-origin-al means the ones who have been there since the beginning, at least etymologically.

Weird that two prefixes so close would be so different

So "american" means "not a merican"?

Until it’s affixed to abnormal

The prefixes hypo- and hyper-, from the Greek, mean below and above, respectively. Hyponatremia and hypernatremia (too little and too much sodium in the blood) are easily-misspoken medical conditions.

Wait till you find out about flammable and inflammable.

[deleted]

What a country!

Abnormal is more normal in this sense, oddly enough.

"Ab" as a word of its own means from, but ab-the prefix usually means "away from" for whatever reason.

So...abnormal = away from normal. Perfectly sensible.

Ab origines, as two words, means from the beginning. Okay, that tracks.

Aborigines, one word, should mean away from the origin/beginning. Wait...what? It's like we lost the space over the years and because latin is stupid and arbitrary sometimes should have inverted the meaning but we kept using it.

[removed]

See that's where my logic was coming from. I figured a- on a word that started with a vowel was awkward, hence ab-

What does abnormal mean then?

A departure from normal. Or possibly an organ donor's name.

I'm pretty sure you're making a joke. But for those who are curious, the Americas were named after Amerigo Vespucci.

The word aboriginal is from the Latin word aborigines which roughly translates to “original inhabitants.”

It’s made up of the prefix ‘ab’ (which usually means “away” or “away from” but also more generally “from” in the sense of the word “of”) and the root ‘origines’ (which is the root word for “original.” So it literally means “from the original.”

That's usually a- and an- like a-theist vs an-esthesia.

A- and an- are greek rooted and mean "not" as in a total nonexistence or rejection of. Like an atheist believes in zero gods.

Ab- is from latin and means away from, but still existing. Like... absent doesn't mean you don't exist, you're just away from here, absorb means to draw something away from where it is now not to destroy it, etc...

Abby? Abby Normal?

Sedagive??!!

The prefix isn't "a" it is "ab". aboriginal comes from "ab-origine". it is from Latin.

It means "from the origin". The idea is that those are native people who have been here from the start and not immigrated later.

It is similar to the idea of "first people" or indigenous (born inside).

Of course if you go far enough back all people everywhere outside of Africa migrated there from somewhere else, but that touches on some problematic religious ideas and in any case the people who first applied those terms didn't know that.

Just as we are not "not Ustralians"

Just because something starts with A does not mean the A is a prefix

Oh yes.. Mungo man

That’s always what my thought process is too. Nobody was originally from anywhere, really. I’m sure all the plants and animals that existed in that space for IDK, billions of years before primitive humans crawled across a land bridge would take issue with us saying humans had always been there. It’s not like the “aboriginal” people even purchased the land from the previous inhabitants; probably just ate and killed them. A bit worse than eminent domain if you ask me.

Put. the candle. back.

Other good "ab-" words:

Absent -- to be away from

Absorb -- to suck away from

Absolve -- to release from

Abhor -- to shudder away from

Abort -- to be born away from (originally meant to miscarry)

Abrogate -- to propose a law away from

It’s Latin rather than Greek.

“A-Meri-Can” means “A Merry Can”.

Otherwise, it would mean “Not A Merry Can”.

Famous and Infamous.

But there are also words that start with a-, meaning "not", and happen to have a root starting with "b", and also loan words from non-latin sources, like "abseil" (German) and "abalone" (native American).

Away from origins.

Away from origin

This is the stuff I wish they taught me in English class.

Please read this entire message

Your submission has been removed for the following reason(s):

Straightforward or factual queries are not allowed on ELI5. ELI5 is meant for simplifying complex concepts.

If you would like this removal reviewed, please read the detailed rules first. If you believe this submission was removed erroneously, please use this form and we will review your submission.

They're from different languages.

a- meaning not is from Greek, and is usually attached to other Greek roots: atheist (from Greek theo "god" as opposed to Latin deus), anoxic ("oxygen" is from Gree roots), etc.

ab- meaning "away from" (as in a direction, the opposite of "towards") is Latin, and is usually attached to other Latin roots.

First time i took the SAT it still had the analogies section. Basically a vocab test and the best way to study for it was prefixes/roots/suffixes.