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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: 4. mer- 'to die'

Semantic Field: to Die; Dead; Death

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
Celtic
Welsh:	marw	adj	dead	LRC
Old Irish:	marb	adj	dead	LRC
	marbaid	vb	to put to death	LRC
English
Old English:	morð	n.masc	death, murder, destruction	LRC
	morðor	n.masc	murder, misery, wickedness	W7
Middle English:	amortisen	vb	to deaden, alienate	W7
	immortal	adj	immortal	W7
	moreyne	n	murrain	W7
	mortal	adj	mortal	W7
	morte-mayne	n	mortmain	W7
	mortuarie	n	mortuary	W7
	mot	n	horn blast, note	W7
	murther, murdre	n	murder	W7
English:	ambrosia	n	food of Greek/Roman gods	AHD/W7
	amortize	vb.trans	to provide for gradual extinguishment (of debt)	AHD/W7
	immortal	adj	exempt from death	AHD/W7
	moribund	adj	dying	AHD/W7
	mort	n	note (sounded on horn) signalling death of prey	AHD/W7
	mortal	adj	fatal, causing death	AHD/W7
	mortar	n	strong vessel where substances are ground/pounded with pestle	AHD/W7
	mortmain	n	inalienable land/building possession	AHD/W7
	mortuary	n	place where dead bodies are kept before burial	AHD/W7
	murder	n	unlawful killing of person	AHD/W7
	murrain	n	plague/pestilence affecting domestic plants/animals	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old High German:	mord	n	death, murder	W7
N-Germanic
Old Norse:	morþ	n	death, murder	LRC
	myrða	vb	to kill, murder	LRC
E-Germanic
Gothic:	maurþr	n	murder	LRC
	maurþrjan	vb	to murder	LRC
Italic
Latin:	ambrosia	n.fem	ambrosia	W7
	immortalis	adj	immortal, eternal	W7
	moribundus	adj	dying	W7
	morior, mori	vb.dep	to die, expire	W7
	mors, mortis	n.fem	death	W7
	mortalis, mortalis, mortale	adj	mortal	LRC
	mortuarius	adj	of the dead	W7
	mortuus	vb.ptc	dead	W7
Vulgar Latin:	admortio, admortīre	vb	to deaden	W7
Old French:	mort, morte	adj	dead	W7
	mortemain	n.fem	mortmain	W7
Middle French:	amortir, amortiss-	vb	to make (a shock) softer	W7
	morine	n.fem	murrain	W7
	morir	vb	to die	W7
	mortel	adj	mortal	W7
	mortemain	n.fem	mortmain	W7
Baltic
Lithuanian:	mir̃ti, mìršta, mìrė	vb	to die	LRC
	mirtìs	n.fem	death	LRC
Slavic
Old Church Slavonic:	mrĕti	vb	to die	LRC
	mrьtvъ	adj	dead	LRC
	sъmrьtь	n.fem	death	LRC
Hellenic
Homeric Greek:	ἀμβροσία	n.fem	ambrosia, immortality	LRC
Greek:	ἄμβροτος	n.masc	immortal man	LRC
	βροτός	n.masc	mortal man	LRC
	*μορτός	n.masc	mortal man	LRC
Anatolian
Hittite:	martari	vb	to disappear	LRC
	merzi	vb	to go missing	LRC
Armenian
Classical Armenian:	mahaber	adj	death-bearing	LRC
	mah	n	death	LRC
	mard	n	(mortal) man	LRC
	mardik	n	mankind, people	LRC
Armenian:	meranim	vb	to die	LRC
Iranian
Avestan:	miryeite	vb	to die	LRC
Old Persian:	am(a)riyatā	vb.pret	(he) died	LRC
Indic
Sanskrit:	márate/mriyáte	vb	to die	LRC

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
adj	=	adjective
dep	=	deponent
fem	=	feminine (gender)
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
pret	=	preterite (tense)
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)