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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.

Note: this page is for systems/browsers with Unicode^® support, but fonts for only the Unicode 2.0 character set (including combining diacritics). Versions of this page rendered in alternate character sets are available via links (see Unicode 3 and ISO-8859-1) in the left margin.

Pokorny Etymon: 5. bhel-, chiefly with suffixes: bh_eləg̑-, bh_elə-n-g̑-, bheleg̑-, bhl̥k̑- 'balk, beam, rafter'

Semantic Field: Beam

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
Celtic
Gaelic:	balc	n	balk, ridge of earth between furrows	ASD
English
Old English:	balc	n	balk: ridge	CDC
	balca	n.masc	balk	ASD
	bolca	n	gangway	CDC
Middle English:	balk(e)	n	balk	W7/CDC
	balken	vb	to plow in ridges	AHD
English:	balcony	n	railed platform projecting from wall	AHD/W7
	balk	n	beam; bank, unplowed land ridge	AHD/W7
	balk	vb	to stop short, refuse to go	AHD
	debauch	vb.trans	to make disloyal	AHD/W7
	fulcrum	n	prop	AHD/W7
	phalange	n	finger bone	AHD/W7
	phalanx	n	heavily armed infantry in close/deep ranks/files	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old Frisian:	balka	n	balk	CDC
Old Dutch:	balke	n	balk	CDC
Dutch:	balk	n.masc	balk	ASD
	balkon	n	balcony	TLL
Old Saxon:	balko	n.masc	balk	ASD
Middle Low German:	balke	n	balk	CDC
Low German:	balke	n	corn loft	CDC
Old High German:	balcho/balko	n.masc	balk	ASD
Middle High German:	balke	n.masc	balk	ASD
German:	Balken	n.masc	balk	LRC
	Balkon	n.masc	balcony	LRC
N-Germanic
Old Norse:	bálkr	n.masc	balk	ASD
Icelandic:	bālkr/bōlkr	n	balk: ridge	CDC
	bjālki	n	balk: beam	CDC
Norwegian:	balk/bolk	n	balk: beam, bar	CDC
Danish:	balk	n	balk: ridge, partition	CDC
	balkon	n	balcony	TLL
	bjälke	n.masc	balk: beam	ASD
Swedish:	balk	n	balk: beam, bar	CDC
	balkong	n	balcony	TLL
	bjelke	n.masc	balk	ASD
	bjälk	n	balk: beam	CDC
Italic
Latin:	fulcio, fulcīre	vb	to prop	W7
	fulcrum	n.neut	bedpost	W7
	phalanx, phalangis	n.fem	phalanx (Greek word)	W7
Old French:	desbauchier	vb	to scatter, roughhew (timber)	W7
Middle French:	debaucher	vb	to debauch, render immoral	W7
French:	balcon	n	balcony	CDC
	phalange	n.fem	phalange	W7
Old Italian:	balcone	n	balcony, scaffold	AHD
Italian:	balco	n	balk: beam	CDC
	balcone	n.masc	balcony	W7
Hellenic
Homeric Greek:	φάλαγξ, φάλαγγος	n.fem	phalanx, battle line	LRC

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
fem	=	feminine (gender)
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
neut	=	neuter (gender)
trans	=	transitive
vb	=	verb

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)
LRC	=	Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
TLL	=	Frederick Bodmer: The Loom of Language (1944)
W7	=	Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)

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