Know

How to spell know

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce know

What does know mean?

1. verbTo have information, understanding, or awareness of something, or to be acquainted with someone.

Know in a sentence

• Do you know the time?

• I know exactly what you mean.

• I'll know more after the meeting.

• Get to know your neighbours.

• I don't know where I left it.

Where does know come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word descends from the Old English verb cnāwan, which meant 'to recognise, to perceive, or to be acquainted with'. It traces back through a common Germanic root and ultimately to an ancient Indo-European root gno-, meaning 'to know', the same deep source that gave Latin its noscere and cognoscere and Greek its gignoskein. In the earliest English the initial k was actually pronounced, so the word sounded something like 'kuh-now', but during the late Middle Ages English speakers stopped articulating the k before n while scribes kept writing it. That historical pronunciation is exactly why know now carries a silent k, a trap it shares with relatives such as knee, knife, and knight. The same gno- root also surfaces in the everyday words 'knowledge' and, more distantly, 'can' and 'cunning', which once meant 'knowing'.

How the word is built

• know (from Old English cnāwan: to recognise, perceive); the silent k- preserves the old Germanic consonant cluster

Words that sound like know

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• no: Not any; not a single one of something.