Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Privative

Priv′a·tive (prĭv′ȧ·tĭv), a. [L. privativus: cf. F. privatif. See Private.] 1. Causing privation; depriving.

2. Consisting in the absence of something; not positive; negative.

Privative blessings, blessings of immunity, safeguard, liberty, and integrity. Jer. Taylor.

3. (Gram.) 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. ἀ), un-, non-, -less.

Priv′a·tive, n.

1. That of which the essence is the absence of something.

Blackness and darkness are indeed but privatives. Bacon.

2. (Logic) A term indicating the absence of any quality which might be naturally or rationally expected; — called also privative term.

3. (Gram.) A privative prefix or suffix. See Privative, a., 3.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.