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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.

Fans of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings may appreciate the source & meaning tips that pop up when the mouse pointer hovers over a non-obvious word or name that he coined from Indo-European (usually Old English or Old Norse) stock. But only reflexes of PIE etyma can be included, and these tend to concentrate in the vocabulary of Rohan and the Shire.

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: kap-ut 'head'

Semantic Field: Head

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
English
Old English:	behēafdian	vb	to behead	AHD
	h(e)afela/heafola/hafala	n.masc	head	RPN/ASD
	hēafod	n	head	RPN
Middle English:	acheven	vb	to achieve	W7
	biheden	vb	to behead	AHD
	cap	n	cape	W7
	capital	adj/n	capital	W7
	capitane	n	captain	W7
	catel	n	cattle	W7
	chapitre	n	chapter; meeting of canons	W7
	chief	n	chief	W7
	chieftaine	n	chieftain	W7
	courchef	n	kerchief	W7
	hed	n	head	W7
	meschief	n	mischief	W7
English:	achieve	vb	to accomplish, bring to successful conclusion	AHD/W7
	behead	vb	to decapitate, sever head from body	AHD/W7
	biceps	n	muscle having two heads	AHD/W7
	caddie	n	one who waits for odd jobs	AHD/W7
	cadet	n	younger son/brother	AHD/W7
	cape	n	point/peninsula of land jutting into water	AHD/W7
	capital	adj	punishable by death	AHD/W7
	capital	n	stock of accumulated goods	AHD/W7
	capitate	adj	forming a head	AHD/W7
	capitation	n	poll tax, direct personal uniform tax	AHD/W7
	capitellum	n	lower end of humerus	AHD
	capitulate	vb.intrans	to parley, negotiate	AHD/W7
	capitulum	n	rounded protuberance of anatomical part	AHD/W7
	capo	n	movable bar attached to fingerboard of fretted instrument	AHD/W9
	capo	n	head of branch of crime syndicate	AHD/W9
	caprice	n	sudden unpredictable turn/change	AHD/W7
	captain	n	commander of military establishment/body of troops	AHD/W7
	cattle	n	domesticated bovine quadrupeds	AHD/W7
	caudillo	n	Spanish/Latin-American strong man	AHD/W7
	chapiter	n	top/capital of column	AHD/W7
	chapter	n	main division of book	AHD/W7
	chef	n	skilled male cook managing kitchen	AHD/W7
	chief	n	upper part of heraldic field	AHD/W7
	chieftain	n	leader of band/clan/tribe	AHD/W7
	corporal	n	enlisted military man of lowest noncommissioned rank	AHD/W7
	decapitate	vb.trans	to behead, cut off head	AHD/W7
	forehead	n	facial part above eyes	AHD/W7
	godhead	n	divinity, divine nature/essence	AHD/W7
	head	n	upper/anterior division of body containing brain and chief sense organs	AHD/W7
	hetman	n	man in charge, lit. head-man	AHD
	kerchief	n	cloth square used as head covering/neck scarf	AHD/W7
	meathead	n	dull/stupid person	AHD
	mischief	n	damage/injury caused by human agency	AHD/W7
	occiput	n	back part of head/skull	AHD/W7
	precipitate	n	solid substance separated from chemical solution/suspension	AHD/W7
	precipitate	vb	to hurl, throw violently	AHD/W7
	recapitulate	vb	to summarize, repeat briefly	AHD/W7
	sinciput	n	forehead	AHD/W7
	Strawheads	prop.n.pl	Rohirrim a.k.a. Forgoil in Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings	LRC
	triceps	n	muscle arising from three heads	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old Frisian:	hāved/hād	n	head	RPN
Dutch:	hoofd	n	head	TLL
	kapitein	n	captain	TLL
Old Saxon:	hōƀid	n	head	RPN
Old High German:	houbit/haupit	n	head	RPN/ASD
Middle High German:	houbetman	n.masc	hetman	AHD
German:	Hauptmann	n.masc	hetman, captain	AHD
	Hetmann	n.dial	hetman	AHD
	Kapitän	n.masc	captain	LRC
N-Germanic
Old Norse:	hǫfuð	n.neut	head	LRC
Danish:	hoved	n	head	TLL
	kaptajn	n	captain	TLL
Swedish:	huvud	n	head	TLL
	kapten	n	captain	TLL
E-Germanic
Gothic:	haubiþ	n	head	RPN
Italic
Latin:	biceps	adj	two-headed	W7
	capillus	n	single hair on head	TLL
	capis, capitis	n	one-handled sacrificial vessel	RPN
	capitalis, capitale	adj	re: head	W7
	capitatus	adj	headed	W7
	capitulum	n.neut	chapter, heading	W7
	caput	n.neut	head	RPN
	occiput, occipitis	n.neut	the back of the head	W7
	praeceps, praecipitis	n.neut	precipice	W7
	praecipitatum	n.neut	precipitate	W7
	praecipitō, praecipitāre, praecipitāvī, praecipitātus	vb	to precipite	W7
	sinciput, sincipitis	n.neut	half a head, the brain	W7
	triceps, tricipitis	adj	three-headed	W7
Late Latin:	capitaneus	n.masc	chief	W7
	capitatio, capitationis	n.fem	poll tax	W7
	capitellum	n.neut	chapter; heading of colum	W7
	decapitō, decapitāre, decapitāvī, decapitātus	vb	to decapitate	W7
	recapitulo, recapitulare, recapitulavi, recapitulatus	vb	to restate by heads, sum up	W7
Medieval Latin:	capitale	adj.neut	of one's property, cattle	W7
	capitulo, capitulare, capitulavi, capitulatus	vb	to distinguish by heads/chapters	W7
	capitulum	n.neut	chapter, division of a book	W7
New Latin:	triceps, tricipitis	n.masc	triceps muscle	W7
Portuguese:	cabeça	n	head	TLL
	cabelo	n	hair	TLL
Spanish:	cabello	n	hair	TLL
	cabo	n	head	TLL
	capítulo	n	chapter	TLL
	caudillo	n.masc	guide/trainer in military exercises	W7
Old French:	chapitle, chapitre	n.masc	chapter	W7
	chief	n.masc	head, chief	W7
	covrir	vb	to cover	W7
	cuevrechief	n.masc	hat, head-covering	W7
	meschief	n.masc	calamity	W7
Old North French:	catel	n.masc	personal property	W7
Middle French:	achever	vb	to finish	W7
	cap	n.masc	cape	W7
	capitain	n.masc	captain	W7
	caporal	n.masc	corporal	W7
	chapitre	n.masc	chapter	W7
	chevetain	n.masc	chieftain	W7
	corporal	n.masc	corporal	W7
French:	cadet	n.masc	military cadet	W7
	capital	n.masc	capital	W7
	caprice	n.masc	caprice	W7
	chapitre	n	chapter	TLL
	chef	n.masc	leader, professional cook	W7
	cheveu	n	hair	TLL
Old Provençal:	cap	n.masc	head	W7
Old Italian:	capo	n.masc	head	W7
	caporale	n.masc	corporal	W7
Italian:	capello	n	hair	TLL
	capitale	adj	chief, principal	W7
	capitale	n.masc	capital, fund, stock	W7
	capo	n.masc	head, chief	W7
	capriccio	n.masc	fancy, caprice	W7
Slavic
Polish:	hetman	n	hetman	AHD
Ukrainian:	het'man	n	hetman	AHD
Indic
Sanskrit:	kapā́la-m	n	cup, bowl; skull	RPN
	kapúcchala-m	n	tuft of hair on back of head	RPN

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
adj	=	adjective
dial	=	dialectal
fem	=	feminine (gender)
intrans	=	intransitive
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
neut	=	neuter (gender)
pl	=	plural (number)
prop	=	proper
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)
LRC	=	Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
RPN	=	Allan R. Bomhard: Reconstructing Proto-Nostratic (2002)
TLL	=	Frederick Bodmer: The Loom of Language (1944)
W7	=	Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)
W9	=	Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary (1983)

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