English
alone
Alone comes from Middle English allone, earlier all oon, from Old English eall ān ‘completely alone’ (eall ‘all’ + ān ‘one’).
- Old Englishc. 450–1150eall ān1
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500all oon1
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500allone1
- Englishearliest quotation c. 1589–1593alone1
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
- 1 Wiktionary, English alone
- Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1589–1593, William Shakespeare, The Two Gentlemen of Verona: “Pardon me, Proteus, all I can is nothing /…”.
Lineage
- Old Englishc. 450–1150eall ānWiktionary, English alone
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500all oonWiktionary, English alone
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500alloneWiktionary, English alone
- Englishearliest quotation c. 1589–1593aloneWiktionary, English alone. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: c. 1589–1593, William Shakespeare, The Two Gentlemen of Verona: “Pardon me, Proteus, all I can is nothing /…”
A compound of eall ‘all’ + ān ‘one’
Proto-Indo-European *h₂el- ‘to grow, nourish’
Proto-Indo-European *h₂elnós
Proto-Germanic *allaz ‘all’
Proto-West Germanic *all ‘all’
Old English eall ‘all’
Proto-Indo-European *ís ‘this, he’
Proto-Indo-European *h₁óynos ‘one’
Proto-Germanic *ainaz ‘one’
Proto-West Germanic *ain ‘one’
Old English ān ‘one’
The story
From Middle English allone, from earlier all oon (literally “all one”), contracted from the Old English phrase eall ān (‘completely alone’), equivalent to al- (‘all’) + one. For the different phonological development of alone and one, see the note in one.
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Today it means
adj By oneself, solitary.
Sources
Sources: Wiktionary, “alone”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.
Etymograph / Old English eall ān / alone