# stark naked

> English word · Adjective

## Definitions
1. Completely naked.

## Etymology
From Middle English stert naked (steort nakt, sternaked, star naked); the first element is from Old English steort (“tail”). The change from "start-naked" to "stark-naked" was most likely by folk etymology due to a misinterpretation of the phrase as being a way of saying "starkly naked" ("strongly naked, harshly naked"). The opposite change has shifted buck naked to butt naked in colloquial modern English.

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/stark-naked