Indo-European Lexicon

PIE Etymon and IE Reflexes

Below we display: a Proto-Indo-European (PIE) etymon adapted from Pokorny, with our own English gloss; our Semantic Field assignment(s) for the etymon, linked to information about the field(s); an optional Comment; and Reflexes (derived words) in various Indo-European languages, organized by family/group in west-to-east order where Germanic is split into West/North/East families and English, our language of primary emphasis, is artificially separated from West Germanic. IE Reflexes appear most often as single words with any optional letter(s) enclosed in parentheses; but alternative full spellings are separated by '/' and "principal parts" appear in a standard order (e.g. masculine, feminine, and neuter forms) separated by commas.

Reflexes are annotated with: Part-of-Speech and/or other Grammatical feature(s); a short Gloss which, especially for modern English reflexes, may be confined to the oldest sense; and some Source citation(s) with 'LRC' always understood as editor. Keys to PoS/Gram feature abbreviations and Source codes appear below the reflexes; at the end are links to the previous/next etyma [in Pokorny's alphabetic order] that have reflexes.

All reflex pages are currently under active construction; as time goes on, corrections may be made and/or more etyma & reflexes may be added.

Pokorny Etymon: bherəg̑-, bhrēg̑-   'to shine; bright, white'

Semantic Field(s): to Shine, Glisten, Bright, White

 

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language Reflex(es) PoS/Gram. Gloss Source(s)
Celtic  
Old Irish: bergann n list of runes (?) GED
Welsh: berth adj beautiful RPN
English  
Old English: be(o)rc n.str.fem birch; (name for) B-rune GED
be(o)rht, byrht, bryht adj bright ASD/W7
bi(e)rce, byrc(e) n.str.fem birch ASD/GED
Middle English: birch, birk(e) n birch CDC/W7
bri(g)ht, bryght(e) adj bright MEV/W7
English: birch n monoecious deciduous tree/shrub AHD/W7
birk n birch AHD/W7
bright adj shining, reflecting/radiating light AHD/W7
Camembert prop.n (village in Basse-Normandie famous for) a cheese LRC
fraxinella n Eurasian perennial herb AHD/W7
Scots English: birk n birch CDC
West Germanic  
Middle Dutch: berck n.str.fem birch CDC
Dutch: berk n.str.fem birch CDC
Old Saxon: ber(a)ht adj bright ASD
Old High German: beraht, peraht adj bright ASD/W7
bircha, birihha n.str.fem birch GED
birka n birch W7
piricha n.wk.fem birch CDC
Middle High German: berht adj bright ASD
birke, birche n.fem birch ASD
German: Birke n.fem birch ASD
North Germanic  
Runic: *berkanan n birch; (name for) B-rune LRC
Old Norse: biartr adj bright ASD
Old Icelandic: birti n brightness RPN
bjarkan n birch; (name for) B-rune GED
bjartr adj bright, shining RPN
bjǫrk n.str.fem birch GED
Icelandic: biörk n.str.fem birch CDC
Danish: birk n.str.fem birch CDC
Swedish: björk n.str.fem birch CDC
East Germanic  
Gothic: bairhtei n brightness RPN
bairhts adj bright, manifest RPN
bercna n birch; (name for) B-rune GED
Italic  
Latin: fraxinus n.fem ash (tree) ELD/GED
New Latin: fraxinella n.dim fraxinella W7
French: Camembert n.fem city in Normandy, France W7
Baltic  
Lithuanian: béržas n birch GED
brė́kšti vb to dawn RPN
Slavic  
Old Church Slavonic: breza n birch CDC
Russian: berëza n birch GED
Albanian  
Albanian: bredh n fir, pine GED
Hellenic  
Greek: βράθυ n (species of) juniper GED
Anatolian  
Hittite: pár-ku-uš adj pure, clean RPN
Palaic: pa-ar-ku-i-ti vb to clean, to purify RPN
Iranian  
Avestan: brāza- n shimmering; radiance RPN
brāzaiti vb to beam RPN
Ossetic: bærz n birch GED
Indic  
Sanskrit: bhargas n splendor, brightness ASD
bhūrjás n (species of) birch GED
bhrā́jate vb to shine, gleam, glitter RPN

 

Key to Part-of-Speech/Grammatical feature abbreviations:

Abbrev. Meaning
adj=adjective
dim=diminutive
fem=feminine (gender)
n=noun
prop=proper
str=strong (inflection)
vb=verb
wk=weak (inflection)

Key to information Source codes (always with 'LRC' as editor):

Code Citation
AHD=Calvert Watkins: The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots, 2nd ed. (2000)
ASD=Joseph Bosworth and T. Northcote Toller: An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary (1898)
CDC=W.D. Whitney and B.E. Smith: The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia (1889-1911)
ELD=Charlton T. Lewis: An Elementary Latin Dictionary (1999)
GED=Winfred P. Lehmann: A Gothic Etymological Dictionary (1986)
LRC=Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
MEV=J.R.R. Tolkien: A Middle English Vocabulary (1922)
RPN=Allan R. Bomhard: Reconstructing Proto-Nostratic (2002)
W7=Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)

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