Word.ws English Dictionary

ab init

ab init is the alternative form of ab initio.

Meaning of ab initio

Adverb

ab initio

  1. From the time when a law, legal right or decree, contract, ownership interest, partnership (etc.) comes into force.
    • As the Act was passed without the required quorum, the constitutional court struck down the Act and declared it to be void ab initio
  2. Calculated from first principles, i.e. from basic laws without any further additional assumptions.
    • […] this soul does not exist ab initio, as orthodox Christianity teaches; it has to be brought into existence by a process of guided self-observation. However, this is rarely achieved, owing to man's unique ability to be distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia.1983, Monty Python, The meaning of life, at about 1h 15'
  3. Taken with no prior qualifications.

Questions about ab init

What is ab init the alternative form of?
Ab init is the alternative form of ab initio.

Words near ab init in the dictionary

  1. ab crack
  2. ab cracks
  3. ab extra
  4. Ab Fab
  5. ab inconvenienti
  6. ab init
  7. ab initio
  8. ab intestato
  9. ab intra
  10. ab invito
  11. Ab Kettleby

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ab init (page history and authors); ab initio (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “ab init.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/ab_init. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.