pretty

The word 'pretty' has undergone a remarkable journey of semantic amelioration, shifting from a negative to a positive connotation. Its Old English ancestor, prættig, meant "cunning" or "crafty," a sense rooted in the idea of skill or artifice. By the late Middle English period, this sense of "skillfully made" began to be applied to things that were pleasing due to their fine craftsmanship, leading to the meaning "attractive" or "charming." This positive aesthetic sense became dominant, eventually specializing to describe delicate attractiveness and also developing an adverbial use meaning "to a considerable degree" by the 16th century.

The word is a simplex form. It is derived from Old English prættig, meaning "cunning, skillful, artful," which itself came from prætt, meaning "a trick, wile." The functional role is that of a complete adjective/adverb root.