Left

How to spell left

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce left

What does left mean?

1. nounThe side of the body or of space that is to the west when one faces north; opposite of right.
2. verbThe past tense and past participle of the verb 'leave', meaning departed or allowed to remain.
3. nounThe section of politics or a party favouring social equality and reform.

Left in a sentence

• noun

  The post office is on the left as you leave the station.

• verb

  He left the office early to beat the traffic.

• noun

  The party's left pushed for higher public spending.

• noun

  She signalled and moved into the left lane.

• verb

  Only two slices of cake were left after the party.

• noun

  Voters on the left welcomed the new welfare policy.

Where does left come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The directional sense of left comes from the Old English word lyft, which surprisingly meant 'weak' or 'foolish'. The left hand was thought of as the weaker hand, and that judgement is preserved in the name itself. By the 1200s the word had largely settled into meaning the side opposite the right, replacing earlier terms. The word that means 'departed' or 'remaining' is a completely different story: it is the past tense and past participle of the verb 'leave', which descends from Old English laefan, meaning 'to allow to remain'. The two words look and sound identical today, but their journeys into English began from quite separate Old English roots.

How the word is built

• left (single root, from Old English lyft meaning weak; no affixes)