aught

pronoun

\ ˈȯt

, ˈät\

Definition of aught

(Entry 1 of 3)

1 : anything

2 : all, everything for aught I care for aught we know

aught

adverb

Definition of aught (Entry 2 of 3)

archaic

: at all

aught

noun

Definition of aught (Entry 3 of 3)

1 : zero, cipher

2 archaic : nonentity, nothing

3 aughts plural : the ten year period from 2000 through 2009 By the middle of the aughts, … the percentage of 26-year-olds living with their parents reached 20 percent, nearly double what it was in 1970.— Don Peck

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Did You Know?

Pronoun

If you know aught which does behove my knowledge / Thereof to be inform'd, imprison't not / In ignorant concealment, Polixenes begs Camillo in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale, employing the "anything" sense of "aught." Shakespeare didn't coin the pronoun "aught," which has been a part of the English language since before the 12th century, but he did put it to frequent use. Writers today may be less likely to use "aught" than were their literary predecessors, but the pronoun does continue to turn up occasionally. "Aught" can also be a noun meaning "zero," and for a while the phrase "the aughts" was bandied about as a proposed label for the decade that began in the year 2000.

Examples of aught in a Sentence

Noun

for dates, the year is automatically listed as a pair of aughts, so the user has to scroll down to the correct figure

Recent Examples on the Web: Noun

For anyone whose teen years overlapped with early-aughts fashion, cargo pants are not new territory. — Glamour, "Cargo Pockets Are the Most Inevitable Trend of 2019," 4 Sep. 2019 Throughout the aughts, Lopez could pull off a meet-cute like no one else and get the right guy by the 90-minute mark. — Ariana Romero, refinery29.com, "It's Jennifer Lopez's Birthday — Here's Where You Can Stream All Her Best Rom-Coms," 25 July 2019 And at the same time, another alt-rock band also popular in the early aughts, Lifehouse, is playing at the U.S. Cellular Connection Stage. — Piet Levy, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, "The 5 worst scheduling conflicts at Summerfest 2019 in Milwaukee, and which shows you should pick," 24 June 2019 Zdar’s pioneering work with Cassius has been credited with shaping the sound of electronic music in the late 1990s and early aughts. — Carlos De Loera, latimes.com, "Legacy of Cassius’ Philippe Zdar honored by Mark Ronson, Calvin Harris," 20 June 2019 Reinhart's resemble those or those of curly-hair, mid-aughts icon, Hilarie Burton. — Amanda Mitchell, Allure, "Lili Reinhart Is Aware Her Curly Hair Makes Her Look Like Sandy From Grease," 7 Aug. 2019 All-white leather with kelly green accents, the Stan Smith sneaker offered a reprieve from the can’t-miss-it clothing of the mid-aughts. — Steff Yotka, Vogue, "We’ve Gotta Have It: The 17 Items that Defined Fashion in the 2010s," 18 July 2019 True to its name, Christy’s Kitchen Throwback features Romano cooking with some of your favorite stars from the ’90s and early aughts, as well as today’s biggest YouTubers. — Lauren Huff, EW.com, "Watch Christy Carlson Romano reunite with Even Stevens costars to reenact classic episode," 18 July 2019 Consider, for example, the reality-TV boom of the late ’90s and early aughts. — Hannah Giorgis, The Atlantic, "The Slow, Messy Evolution of LGBTQ Dating Shows," 4 July 2019

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'aught.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

History and Etymology for aught

Pronoun and Adverb

Middle English, from Old English āwiht, from ā ever + wiht creature, thing — more at aye, wight

Noun

alteration (resulting from false division of a naught) of naught

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More Definitions for aught

aught

noun

\ ˈȯt

Kids Definition of aught

: zero sense 1

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aught

Definition of aught

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Did You Know?

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First Known Use of aught

History and Etymology for aught

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aught

Definition of aught

Synonyms for aught

Did You Know?

Examples of aught in a Sentence

First Known Use of aught

History and Etymology for aught

Kids Definition of aught

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