"ungrammatical," 1874, from a- (3) "not, without, opposite of" + syntactic. Earlier it was used in classifying languages, "opposite of syntactic" (1819).
Entries linking to asyntactic
a- 3
prefix meaning "not, without," from Greek a-, an- "not" (the "alpha privative"), from PIE root *ne- "not" (source also of English un-).
In words from Greek, such as abysmal, adamant, amethyst; also partly nativized as a prefix of negation (asexual, amoral, agnostic). The ancient alpha privatum, denoting want or absence.
Greek also had an alpha copulativum, a- or ha-, expressing union or likeness, which is the a- expressing "together" in acolyte, acoustic, Adelphi, etc. It is from PIE root *sem- (1) "one; as one, together with."
syntactic adj.
1771, from Modern Latin syntacticus, from Greek syntaktikos "a joining together, a joining in order," from syntassein "put in order" (see syntax).