Pristine
Etymology
From Latin "pristinus" ("former, earlier, original"), related to "priscus" ("ancient") and "prior" ("earlier"). For centuries it meant simply "original, belonging to the earliest state." The now-dominant sense of "spotless and unspoiled" is largely a twentieth-century development from that idea of an untouched original condition.
adjective · /PRIS-teen/
In its original, unspoiled, perfectly clean condition.
What it names
The word for something untouched and immaculate — fresh snow, an unlogged wilderness, a car kept as new.
Example
The mountain lake was pristine, its water clear all the way to the stones on the bottom.
Related idea
Immaculate stresses spotless cleanliness; pristine adds the sense of an original, untouched state.
See also