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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: (s)p(h)i̯ēu- : (s)pi̯ū-, (s)pīu̯- 'to spit, spew, sputter'

Semantic Field: to Spit

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
English
Old English:	spǣtl/spātl	n.neut	spittle	W7
	spittan/spyttan	vb.wk	to spit	W7/ASD
	spīwan	vb.str	to spew	W7/ASD
Middle English:	spetil	n	spittle	W7
	spewen	vb	to spew	W7
	spitten	vb	to spit	W7
	spouten	vb	to spout	W7
English:	cuspidor	n	spittoon	AHD/W7
	hemoptysis	n	expectoration of blood from respiratory tract	AHD/W7
	ptyalin	n	amylase found in saliva	AHD/W7
	spew	vb	to vomit	AHD/W7
	spit, spat	vb.str	to expectorate, eject (saliva) from mouth	AHD/W7
	spit	n	spittle	W7
	spittle	n	saliva	AHD/W7
	spittoon	n	receptacle for spit	W7
	spout	vb	to eject (liquid) in a stream	AHD/W7
	sputter	vb	to splutter, spit/squirt noisily from mouth	AHD/W7
	sputum	n	expectorated matter (incl. saliva etc.)	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old Frisian:	spī(g)a	vb	to spew	ASD
Middle Dutch:	spoiten	vb	to spout	W7
Dutch:	sputteren	vb	to sputter	W7
Old Saxon:	spīwan	vb	to spew	ASD
Old High German:	spīwan	vb	to spit, spew	W7
German:	speutzen/spützen	vb	to spit	ASD
	Spucke	n.fem	spit	LRC
	spucken	vb	to spit	LRC
N-Germanic
Icelandic:	spýja	vb	to spew	ASD
	spýta	vb	to spit	ASD
E-Germanic
Gothic:	speiwan	vb	to spit	ASD
Italic
Latin:	conspuo, conspuere	vb	to spit on	W7
	spuo, spuere	vb	to spit	W7
	sputum	n.neut	spit, spittle	W7
	sputus	vb.ptc	spit	W7
New Latin:	hemoptysis	n.fem	expectoration of blood	W7
Portuguese:	cuspidouro	n.masc	cuspidor	W7
	cuspir	vb	to spit	W7
Hellenic
Homeric Greek:	πτύω	vb	to spit	LRC
Greek:	ptyalon	n.neut	saliva	W7
	ptysis	n.fem	act of spitting	W7

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
fem	=	feminine (gender)
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
neut	=	neuter (gender)
ptc	=	participle
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)
LRC	=	Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
W7	=	Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)

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