The University of Texas at Austin; College of Liberal Arts

Hans C. Boas, Director :: PCL 5.556, 1 University Station S5490 :: Austin, TX 78712 :: 512-471-4566

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 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: leubh- 'to love, like, care for'

Semantic Field: to Love; Love

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
English
Old English:	alȳfan	vb	to allow	W7
	belēfan	vb	to believe	W7
	(ge)lēafa	n.masc	belief	W7/ASD
	gelīefan, gelīefde, gelīefed	vb.wk.I	to grant; believe, trust	LRC
	lēaf	n.fem	leave, permission	W7/ASD
	lēof	adj	lief	LRC
	lī(e)fan/lēfan/lȳfan	vb.wk.I	to allow, believe	W7/ASD
	lof-dǣd	n.str.fem	praiseworthy deed	LRC
	lufu	n.fem	love	W7/ASD
Middle English:	beleave/beleeve	n	belief	W7/MEV
	beleven	vb	to believe	W7
	leve	n	leave	W7
	l(i)ef	adj	lief	W7
	love	n	love	W7
	quodlibet	n	quodlibet	W7
English:	belief	n	state of mind: trust/confidence is placed in person/thing	AHD/W7
	believe	vb	to have firm religious faith	AHD/W7
	furlough	n	leave of absence	AHD/W7
	leave	n	permission	AHD/W7
	Léofa	prop.n	11th Rohan king (as Brytta) in Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings	LRC
	libido	n	passion, sexual desire	AHD/W7
	lief	adj	dear, beloved	AHD/W7
	livelong	adj	whole, entire	AHD/W7
	love	n	affection based on admiration/benevolence	AHD/W7
	love	vb	to cherish, hold dear	W7
	quodlibet	n	whimsical combination of familiar texts/melodies	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old Frisian:	liaf/lief	adj	lief	ASD
Middle Dutch:	lof	n	praise	W7
	verlof	n	leave	W7
Dutch:	lof	n	praise	LRC
	verlof	n	leave	W7
	veroorloven	n	to allow, give leave	LRC
Old Saxon:	gi-lōƀo	n	belief	ASD
	liof	adj	lief	ASD
	or-lōf	n	leave	ASD
Old High German:	gilouben	vb	to believe	W7
	ki-lauba	n	belief	ASD
	laubo	n	belief	ASD
	liob/liub/lieb	adj	lief	ASD
	lupa	n	love	W7
	urlaup	n	leave	ASD
Middle High German:	loube	n	leave	W7
German:	erlauben	vb	to allow, give leave	LRC
	Glaube	n.masc	belief	ASD
	lieb	adj	lief	ASD
	Liebe	n.fem	love	LRC
	lieben	vb	to love	LRC
	Urlaub	n.masc	furlough, vacation	LRC
N-Germanic
Old Norse:	lof	n.neut	praise	LRC
	lofa, lofað	vb	to praise; allow, permit	LRC
Old Icelandic:	ljúfr	adj	lief	LRC
Icelandic:	leyfa	vb	to permit	ASD
	leyfi	n	leave	ASD
	ljúfr	adj	lief	ASD
	or-lof	n	leave	ASD
E-Germanic
Gothic:	ga-laubeins	n	belief	ASD
	ga-láubjan	vb.wk.I	to believe	LRC
	liufs/liubs	adj	lief	ASD
Italic
Latin:	libet/lubet, libēre/lubēre	vb.impers	to please, be lief	W7
	libido	n.fem	libido	W7
	quilibet	pron	any whatever	W7
	quodlibet	pron.neut	whatever	W7
Medieval Latin:	quodlibetum	n.neut	subtle theological question posed for argument	W7
New Latin:	libido, libidinis	n.fem	passion, sexual desire	W7
Baltic
Lithuanian:	liaupsẽ	vb.ptc	praising	LRC
Slavic
Old Church Slavonic:	ljubiti, ljubljǫ, ljubiši	vb	to love	LRC
Albanian
Albanian:	laps	vb	to wish, want	LRC
Hellenic
Hesychius' Greek Lexicon:	λυπτά	n	concubine, prostitute	LRC
Indic
Sanskrit:	lúbhyati	vb	to feel strong desire	LRC

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
I	=	class 1
adj	=	adjective
fem	=	feminine (gender)
impers	=	impersonal (verb)
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
neut	=	neuter (gender)
pron	=	pronoun
prop	=	proper
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
MEV	=	J.R.R. Tolkien: A Middle English Vocabulary (1922)
W7	=	Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)

Nearby etyma: previous | next