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I'm reading this dictionary entry for "ravel":

transitive verb
1 a : to separate or undo the texture of : unravel
b : to undo the intricacies of : disentangle

intransitive verb
1 obsolete : to become entangled or confused
2 : to become unwoven, untwisted, or unwound : fray
:3 break up, crumble

Some of these seem very similar to the meaning of "unravel" - ostensibly its opposite. Why is that?

einpoklum
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  • Yes. Same thing with raze, with cleave, and so forth. Does a pitted olive have a pit, or was its pit removed? If something is inflammable, can I smoke near it? This phenomenon is known as a contranym and gets a lot of press in popular discussions about English. Maybe it happens in other languages too. Don’t know. – Dan Bron Mar 09 '18 at 13:37
  • @DanBron: About inflammable - "in" is not necessary a negating prefix. About raze or cleave - not quite sure what you mean. But thanks for naming the general phenomenon. – einpoklum Mar 09 '18 at 14:39
  • Cleave means tear apart as well as bind together. The world inflammable can mean combustible or not combustible. There is no "why" to natural languages, or, rather, asking "why" is the wrong question. A tree has just so many branches, no more, no less. Asking "why" is, in some sense, meaningless. So it is for the growth and pruning of natural languages. – Dan Bron Mar 09 '18 at 14:41

1 Answers1

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It is a question of the prefix “un” which can be both reversive or intensitive, and yes, in the sense on untangle they have the same meaning:

Ravel probably comes from the Dutch word ravelen, meaning to 'fray out, tangle', and was first used in late Middle English with the sense of 'entangle, confuse'. Interestingly, the more commonly used verb definitions of ravel in Modern English actually have the opposite meaning: 'untangle', for example 'ravel something out'; and 'unravel; fray, as in a 'ravelled collar' (the latter not in American usage). It's only the third verb definition, 'confuse or complicate', and the noun meaning, 'a tangle, cluster, knot', that are closer to the original meaning

Unravel:

c. 1600 (transitive), from un- (2) + ravel (v.). Intransitive from 1640s. "The prefix is either reversive or intensive, according as ravel is taken to mean 'tangle' or 'untangle'" [Century Dictionary]. (Etymonline)

Unravel, is a verb which means to either 'undo', for example twisted threads, or to 'investigate and solve or explain' something which is complex or puzzling. A couple of examples of using unravel are:

(fandom-grammar)

Community
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user 66974
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  • So it seems that originally ravel meant to tangle, and unravel meant to untangle. I think un- is reversive here. Can you name any other intensive uses of un-? – Peter Shor Mar 09 '18 at 14:25