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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 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: lī̆-no- 'flax, linen'

Semantic Field: Flax, Linen

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
English
Old English:	līn	n.neut	flax, linen	W7
	līne	n.fem	line	W7
	līnen	adj	linen	W7
	līnsǣd	n.neut	linseed	W7/ASD
Middle English:	line	n	line	W7
	linen	adj	linen	W7
	linen	vb	to line	W7
	linseed	n	linseed	W7
English:	align	vb	to bring into line/alignment	AHD/W7
	crinoline	n	open-weave fabric of cotton/horsehair	AHD/W7
	line	n	rope, cord, string, thread	AHD/W7
	line	vb.trans	to cover inner surface	AHD/W7
	linen	adj/n	(cloth) made of flax	AHD/W7
	lingerie	n	linen articles/(under)garments	AHD/W7
	linnet	n	small Old World finch	AHD/W7
	linseed	n	flaxseed	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old Saxon:	līn	n	flax, linen	ASD
Old High German:	līn	n	flax, linen	W7
	līnin	adj	linen	ASD
	linna	n	line	ASD
German:	Lein	n	flax, linen	ASD
	leinen	adj	linen	ASD
N-Germanic
Icelandic:	lín	n	flax, linen	ASD
	lína	n	line	ASD
E-Germanic
Gothic:	lein	n	linen	ASD
Italic
Latin:	linea	n.fem	line	W7
	lineus	adj	linen	W7
	linum	n.neut	flax, linen	W7
Old French:	aligner	vb	to align	W7
	ligne	n.fem	line	W7
Middle French:	lin	n.masc	flax, linen	W7
	linette	n.fem	linnet	W7
	linge	n.masc	linen	W7
	lingerie	n.fem	lingerie	W7
French:	aligner	vb	to align	W7
	crinoline	n.fem	crinoline	W7
	ligne	n.fem	line	W7
	lingerie	n.fem	lingerie	W7
Italian:	crinolina	n.fem	crinoline	W7
Hellenic
Greek:	λίνεος	adj	linen	LRC
	λίνον	n.neut	flax, linen	LRC

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
adj	=	adjective
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)
LRC	=	Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
W7	=	Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)

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