English
whatever
/ʍɒtˈɛv.ə/
A thing or person whose actual name is unknown or forgotten.
Etymology graph
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- borrowed
- derived
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- meaning component
- sound component
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Origin
From Middle English whatever. By surface analysis, what + -ever.
From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Lineage
- inheritedMiddle Englishwhatever
- surface analysisEnglishwhat “Which, especially which of an open-ended set of possibilities.”
- suffixEnglish-s “Used to form regular plurals of nouns.”
- inheritedMiddle English-es “adverbial ending”
- inheritedOld English-es “-'s”
- inheritedOld English-as
- inheritedOld English-es, -as
- derivedOld English-es “-'s”
- derivedEnglish-sy “Suffix forming nouns or adjectives, sometimes diminutive and usually informal or jocular.”
- suffixEnglish-y “Added to nouns and adjectives to form adjectives meaning “having the quality of”, either “involving…”
- derivedEnglish-'s “A possessive marker, indicating that an object belongs to the noun or noun phrase bearing the marke…”
- inheritedMiddle English-s
- inheritedMiddle English-es “adverbial ending”
- surface analysisEnglish-ever “Attached to interrogatives, forms indefinite pronouns and adverbs.”