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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.

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: 2. meug-, meuk- 'to slip, slide; meek'

Semantic Field: to Slip, Slide

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
English
Old English:	sméag	adj	smart, shrewd, cunning, sagacious	IEW
	smēa(ga)n	vb.str	to seek, ponder, examine, investigate	IEW/ASD
	sméagol	adj	thin, narrow; slim, slender	IEW
	smoc(c)	n.masc	smock	W7
	smūgan	vb.str	to sneak, creep, crawl; slip, slide	IEW/ASD
	smygel(s)	n.masc	burrow, place to creep into	ASD
Middle English:	macche	n	match	W7
	meek	adj	meek	W7
	moiste	adj	moist	W7
	mowlde	n	mold	W7
	muscilage	n	mucilage	W7
	smok	n	smock	W7
English:	emunctory	n	organ for carrying off body wastes	AHD/W7
	match	n	wick/cord chemically prepared for burning	AHD/W7
	meek	adj	mild, enduring injury with patience/without resentment	AHD/W7
	moist	adj	damp, slightly/moderately wet	AHD/W7
	moisture	n	wetness	TLL
	mold	n	superficial growth on damp/decaying organic matter	AHD/W7
	mucilage	n	gelatinous substance (from seaweed) similar to plant gums	AHD/W7
	mucus	n	viscid slippery secretion from mucous membranes	AHD/W7
	mug	n	drizzle	AHD/W7
	muggy	adj	warm, damp, and close	AHD/W7
	musty	adj	stale/moldy in taste/odor	AHD
	saccharomyces	n	single-celled sugar-fermenting yeast	AHD
	schmuck	n	oaf, stupid/clumsy person	AHD
	Smaug	prop.n	worm/dragon in Tolkien: The Hobbit	LRC
	Sméagol	prop.n	a.k.a. Gollum in Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings	LRC
	smial	n	hobbit-hole in Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings	LRC
	smock	n	woman's undergarment	AHD/W7
	smug	adj	spruce, trim/smart in dress	AHD/W7
	smuggle	vb	to import/export secretly (without paying duties)	AHD/W7
	streptomyces	n.pl	soil actinomycetes	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Dutch:	smokkelen	vb	to smuggle	W7
Middle Low German:	smuck	adj	supple, pliant	W7
	smucken	vb	to dress	W7
Low German:	smuck	adj	neat, smug	W7
	smuggeln	vb	to smuggle	W7
Old High German:	smocco	n	adornment	W7
Middle High German:	smiegen	vb	to creep, crawl	ASD
N-Germanic
Old Norse:	mjūkr	adj	gentle	W7
	myki	n	dung	W7
	*smaug	adj	smart, shrewd, cunning, sagacious	LRC
	smjúga	vb	to pierce, creep through/under	ICE
Icelandic:	smjúga, smaug	vb	to pierce, creep through/under	ICE
	smogall/smugall	adj	penetrating	ASD
	smuga	n.fem	hole, narrow cleft to creep through	ASD
Italic
Latin:	emungo, emungere, emunxī, emunctus	vb	to clean the nose	W7
	mucidus	adj	slimy	W7
	mucus	n.masc	mucus	W7
Vulgar Latin:	muscidus	adj	moist	W7
Late Latin:	mucilago	n.fem	mucus; musty juice	W7
New Latin:	emunctorium	n.neut	handkerchief	W7
	streptomyces	n.masc.pl	genus of soil actinomycetes	W7
Middle French:	meiche	n.fem	match, cord to fire firearms	W7
	moiste	adj	moist, wet	W7
Baltic
Latvian:	izmaukt, izmaucu, izmaucu	vb	to be carved from, hollowed out	LRC
Hellenic
Greek:	mykēs	n.masc	a fungus	W7
	myxa	n.fem	mucus	W7

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
adj	=	adjective
fem	=	feminine (gender)
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
neut	=	neuter (gender)
pl	=	plural (number)
prop	=	proper
str	=	strong (inflection)
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)
ICE	=	Richard Cleasby and Gudbrand Vigfusson: An Icelandic-English Dictionary (1874)
IEW	=	Julius Pokorny: Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch (1959)
LRC	=	Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
TLL	=	Frederick Bodmer: The Loom of Language (1944)
W7	=	Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)

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