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Indo-European Lexicon

PIE Etymon and IE Reflexes

Below we display: a Proto-Indo-European (PIE) etymon from Pokorny, with an 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 "principle 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 at the end. All reflex pages are currently under active construction; as time goes on corrections may be made and/or more reflexes may be added.

Note: this page is for systems/browsers with Unicode^® support and fonts spanning the Unicode 3 character set relevant to Indo-European languages. Versions of this page rendered in alternate character sets are available via links (see Unicode 2 and ISO-8859-1) in the left margin.

Pokorny Etymon: leg^u̯h- 'to move easily'

Semantic Field: to Move

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
English
Old English:	lēoht	adj	light (in weight), easy	LRC
	lungen	n	lung	W7
Middle English:	elevaten	vb	to elevate	W7
	legerdemain	n	legerdemain	W7
	levain	n	leaven	W7
	lever	n	lever	W7
	light	adj	light (in weight)	W7
	lighter	n	lighter	W7
	lunge	n	lung	W7
	releven	vb	to relieve	W7
English:	alleviate	vb.trans	to moderate, make easier to endure	AHD/W7
	carnival	n	pre-Lenten season/festival of merrymaking	AHD/W7
	elevate	vb.trans	to raise, lift up	AHD/W7
	leaven	n	substance (e.g. yeast) producing gas/fermentation in dough/liquid	AHD/W7
	legerdemain	n	sleight of hand	AHD/W7
	lever	n	bar used to pry/dislodge something	AHD/W7
	levity	n	excessive/unseemly frivolity	AHD/W7
	light	adj	not heavy, having little weight	AHD/W7
	lighter	n	large flat-bottomed barge used to load/unload ships	AHD/W7
	lung	n	compound saccular thoracic respiratory organ of air-breathing vertebrate	AHD/W7
	mezzo-relievo	n	sculptural relief between bas-/high relief	AHD/W7
	relevant	adj	pertinent, bearing upon matter at hand	AHD/W7
	relieve	vb	to succor, free from evil/burden/distress	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old High German:	līhti	adj	light (in weight)	W7
	lungun	n	lung	W7
Middle Dutch:	lichten	vb	to unload	W7
	lichter	n	lighter	W7
Italic
Latin:	elevo, elevare, elevavi, elevatus	vb	to raise	W7
	levis	adj	light, smooth, mild	W7
	levitas, levitatis	n.fem	lightness, inconstancy	W7
	levo, levāre	vb	to lift, raise	W7
	relevo, relevare	vb	to raise up	W7
Vulgar Latin:	levamen	n.neut	leaven	W7
Late Latin:	allevio, alleviare, alleviavi, alleviatus	vb	to make light	W7
Medieval Latin:	relevans, relevantis	adj/vb.ptc	relevant	W7
Italian:	carnevale	n.masc	carnival	W7
	mezzorilievo	n.masc	half-relief	W7
	rilievo	n.masc	relief, remark	W7
Old French:	lever	vb	to raise	W7
	levier	n.masc	lever	W7
Middle French:	levain	n.masc	leaven	W7
	relever	vb	to raise, relieve	W7
Baltic
Lithuanian:	leñgvas, lengvà	adj	easy	LRC
Hellenic
Greek:	elachys	adj	small	W7

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

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