köken: From Old French alcun, from Vulgar Latin *alicunus, from Latin aliquī + unus. Cognate with Italian alcuno, Spanish alguno, Galician algún, Portuguese algum.
neither, not ... either (also not) · Used to emphasize lack of alternatives. · Used to soften a question, e.g. when the speaker is asking to be reminded of something, or when the speaker is seeking agreement or confirmation.
zıt: -kin
köken: According to Hakulinen, from earlier *-kahan, composed of -ka (as seen in joka and kuka) and -han, and why the particle is restricted to contexts with negative polarity is not clear. Räisänen (1996) presents an alternative etymology, in which the particle originates from the partitive forms of indefinite pronouns like ketään, mitään, in which it is developed from a reduction of -ka through…
neither, neither one · neuter (gender) · neuter, intransitive (of a verb)
köken: Etymology tree Latin ne Proto-Indo-European *kʷ- Proto-Indo-European *kʷos Proto-Indo-European *-teros Proto-Indo-European *kʷóteros Proto-Italic *kʷoteros Latin uter Latin neuter From ne (“not”) + uter (“either”). In the grammatical sense, a semantic loan from Koine Greek οὐδέτερος (oudéteros), from οὐδέ (oudé, “not”) + ἕτερος (héteros, “one or the other (of two)”).
köken: From Old Danish hwærkin, hwærki, from Old Norse hvárki, cognate with Norwegian Nynorsk korkje, Swedish varken. The neuter of the Old Norse pronoun hvár(r)gi (“either, neither”), from hvárr (“which (of two)”) + -gi (“no”). The first part goes back to Proto-Germanic *hwaþeraz (“which (of two)”), cognate with English whether, German weder (“neither”).
always in the combination: hverken … eller "neither … nor" (also after a negative, meaning "either … or")