privative

• POS: Adjective
• HYPHEN: priv=a=tive

CIDE DICTIONARY

privative, a. [L. privativus: cf. F. privatif. See Private.].

•  Causing privation; depriving.  [1913 Webster]
•  Consisting in the absence of something; not positive; negative.  [1913 Webster]

  "Privative blessings, blessings of immunity, safeguard, liberty, and integrity."  [1913 Webster]
•  Implying privation or negation; giving a negative force to a word; as, alpha privative; privative particles; -- applied to such prefixes and suffixes as a- (Gr. un-, non-, -less.  [1913 Webster]

privative, n. 

•  That of which the essence is the absence of something.  [1913 Webster]

  "Blackness and darkness are indeed but privatives."  [1913 Webster]
•  A term indicating the absence of any quality which might be naturally or rationally expected; -- called also privative term.  [1913 Webster]
•  A privative prefix or suffix. See Privative, a., 3.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

privative, adj.
1 consisting in or marked by the loss or removal or absence of some quality or attribute.
2 (of a term) denoting the privation or absence of a quality etc.
3 Gram. (of a particle etc.) expressing privation, as Gk a- = 'not'.

Derivative

privatively adv.

Etymology

F privatif -ive or L privativus (as PRIVATION)

ROGET THESAURUS

privative

Taking

N taking, reception, deglutition, appropriation, prehension, prensation, capture, caption, apprehension, deprehension, abreption, seizure, expropriation, abduction, ablation, subtraction, withdrawal, abstraction, ademption, adrolepsy, dispossession, deprivation, deprivement, bereavement, divestment, disherison, distraint, distress, sequestration, confiscation, eviction, rapacity, rapaciousness, extortion, vampirism, theft, resumption, reprise, reprisal, recovery, clutch, swoop, wrench, grip, haul, take, catch, scramble, taker, captor, subduction, taking, privative, prehensile, predaceous, predal, predatory, predatorial, lupine, rapacious, raptorial, ravenous, parasitic, bereft, at one fell swoop, give an inch and take an ell.