The Birth of the Word: NAT

Root of the Week for 12/22/25

The root NAT originates from the Latin word natus, which means "born." From this root we get many English words having to do with origins, like nativity and prenatal, and also words having to do with nature (the origin of us all) and with nations, once conceived as places populated by those born there, that is, “natives”. 

MONDAY - Native (Noun & Adjective), Nativity (Noun)

A native of a place is someone who was born there.  We use the term Native American to refer specifically to the many indigenous peoples of North America, but a “native New Yorker” is not usually an indigenous person but rather someone born in and acclimated to New York City.

Nativity means “birth.” We don’t refer to most babies’ nativities (we just call them “births”) but in Christian cultures, “the Nativity” is always used to refer to the birth of Jesus, and nativity scenes celebrating that event are widely and publicly displayed at Christmas time.

TUESDAY - Nation (Noun), Multinational (Adjective), International (Adjective), Nationality (Noun), Naturalized (Adjective)

The Latin word natio means “birth, origin, kind.” It entered Middle English as nacioun, referring to a race of people with a common ancestry. We use the word nation today to refer to a political entity: a nation is a geographic territory with a sovereign government. 

The modern world is both multinational and international: that is, there are many nations and they interact with one another. A person’s nationality (the nation of which that person is a citizen) is not always determined by nativity (where the person was born). A person born in Japan or Peru can become a naturalized citizen of another country by fulfilling certain legal requirements.

WEDNESDAY - Nature (Noun), Innate (Adjective), Natural (Adjective), Naïve (Adjective)

We use the English word nature, derived from the Latin natura, in different ways. We use it to refer to all the phenomena of the physical world that are not made by humans: plants, animals, rocks, rivers, mountains, stars, etc.  We also use it to refer to the “laws of nature,” the regular workings of the physical universe. And when we speak of a person’s nature, we are referring to his or her innate (inborn) character or characteristic temperament.  

Similarly, the descriptor natural is used in a variety of ways.  Food companies love to label their products natural because we have become increasingly suspicious of artificial ingredients and assume that what is natural is healthier. Of course, lots of hazardous substances are natural, including asbestos, arsenic, cyanide, and botulism.

When we use natural to refer to human behavior, we are often making assumptions about what is innate and inevitable, as in “It’s only natural that the kid hit his sister—she took his toy truck!” What do we assume about so-called human nature? Over the centuries, thinkers have differed greatly on this point. The philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588 to 1679) opined that, without the artificial restraints imposed by government, life in a state of nature would be “nasty, brutish, and short” because humans’ natural aggression and selfishness would produce endless strife. The poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) wrote of “Nature, red in tooth and claw,” echoing the idea that nature was a condition of merciless violence.

A very different view was central to the thinking of the eighteenth-century philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778), who regarded nature as a state of innocence. The vices and cruelties of human beings were produced by society, not inherent to human nature. Rousseau advocated educating children in a way that would preserve rather than extirpate nature, since he saw children as naturally benevolent, curious creatures. The word naïve also comes from the Latin root NAT, appearing first in French and then migrating into English. It means innocent, natural, unaffected by worldly experience. In this way, it implicitly endorses the idea that human nature is essentially benign.

THURSDAY - Supernatural (Adjective and Noun), Preternatural (Adjective and Noun), Unnatural (Adjective and Noun)

The Latin prefix super means “above.” We say something is supernatural if it appears to be “above” or outside of nature—something which can’t be explained within the scientific framework of the laws of nature, such as ghosts and spirits. Myths, legends, and fairy tales are filled with such wonders. The word preternatural is very similar (preter, like super, means “above, beyond, outside”). In modern usage, preternatural is sometimes a virtual synonym of supernatural although it is also used to mean something like “extraordinary” or “uncanny.” We might say that someone has a preternatural ability to anticipate events or a preternatural talent for music.

The supernatural and the preternatural may be either benign or terrible phenomena, but when we say something is unnatural, it is usually a condemnation. Shakespeare’s King Lear lashes out at his disobedient daughters, calling them “unnatural hags!” If daughterly obedience is natural, then Regan and Goneril are monsters.

FRIDAY - Natal (Adjective), Prenatal (Adjective), Postnatal (Adjective), Neonate (Noun), Nascent (Adjective)

Natal means “of, relating to, or present at birth” and many prefixes can be attached to it, such as the familiar Latin prefixes pre and post. Ideally, pregnant people should receive prenatal care to help them stay healthy through the challenges of pregnancy and postnatal care after the neonate (newborn) appears in the world.

Natal is used not only with reference to people, of course, but also with reference to animals and even to stars. Salmon return annually to their natal streams to lay their eggs. Scientists sometimes speak metaphorically of “newborn” stars that form in their natal part of the universe but can sometimes be propelled by gravity outward into space. But the metaphor relating nascent (recently formed) stars to babies may have a whiff of the literal to it: Joni Mitchell’s song lyric “we are stardust” refers to the physical fact that most of the atoms in our bodies were formed in stars over billions of years. We are all natives of our starry universe.