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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: nek^u̯-(t-), nok^u̯-t-s 'night'

Semantic Field: Night

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
English
Old English:	niht/næht/næct/neht/nyht	n.fem	night	ASD
	niht-scū(w)a	n.masc	night's cover	ASD
	niht-waco	n.fem	night-watch	LRC
Middle English:	equinox	n	equinox	W7
	fourtenight	n	fortnight	W7
	night	n	night	W7
	nocturne	n	nocturn	W7
English:	denigrate	vb.trans	to defame, cast aspersions on	AHD/W7
	equinox	n	when day and night are equally long	AHD/W7
	fortnight	n	period of 2 weeks, lit. 14 nights	AHD/W7
	Kristallnacht	prop.n	Night of Broken Glass: Nazi anti-Jewish pogrom	AHD
	negro	n.arch	person of black ethnicity	AHD
	niello	n	deep black metal alloy: sulfur with silver/copper/lead	AHD/W7
	nigella	n	(wild) fennel	AHD
	night	n	dusk-to-dawn period when no sunlight is visible	AHD/W7
	nightmare	n	incubus, evil spirit that oppresses during sleep	AHD/CDC
	nigrescence	n	process of becoming dark/black	AHD/W7
	nigrescent	adj	blackish	W7
	nigrosine	n	azine dyes related to indulines	AHD/W7
	noct(i)-	pfx	night	AHD
	nocto-	pfx	night	W7
	noctuid	n	night-flying moth	AHD
	noctule	n	reddish-brown insectivorous bat	AHD
	nocturn	n	principal division of office of matins	AHD/W7
	nocturnal	adj	re: night	AHD/W7
	nyctalopia	n	night blindness	AHD
	nyctitropism	n	tendency of plant leaves to change position at nightfall	AHD
	nyctophobia	n	fear of night/darkness	AHD
	streptonigrin	n	highly toxic antibiotic for tumors	AHD
W-Germanic
Old Frisian:	nacht	n	night	ASD
Dutch:	nacht	n	night	LRC
Old Saxon:	naht	n	night	ASD
Old High German:	naht	n	night	W7
German:	Kristallnacht	prop.n.fem	Kristallnacht, lit. crystal night	AHD
	Nacht	n.fem	night	LRC
	Nachtmahr	n.masc	nightmare	IEW
	Weihnachten	n.neut	Christmas, lit. holy nights	LRC
N-Germanic
Old Norse:	nótt	n.fem	night	LRC
Icelandic:	nātt/nōtt	n	night	ASD
Danish:	nat	n	night	LRC
Swedish:	natt	n	night	LRC
E-Germanic
Gothic:	nahts	n.wk.fem	night	LRC
Italic
Latin:	aequinoctium	n.neut	equinox	W7
	denigro, denigrare, denigravi, denigratus	vb	to denigrate	W7
	nigellus	adj	blackish	W7
	niger	adj	black	W7
	nigro, nigrare	vb	to blacken	W7
	nocturnus	adj	of the night	W7
	nox, noctis	n.fem	night	LRC
Late Latin:	nocturnalis	adj	of the night	W7
Medieval Latin:	equinoxium	n.neut	equinox	W7
Portuguese:	negro	adj	black	TLL/AHD
	noite	n	night	TLL
Spanish:	negro	adj	black	TLL/AHD
	noche	n	night	TLL
Middle French:	equinoxe	n.fem	equinox	W7
	nocturne	adj	of the night	W7
French:	noir	adj	black	TLL/AHD
	nuit	n	night	TLL
Italian:	nero	adj	black	TLL/AHD
	nièllo	n.masc	niello, inlaid enamelwork	W7/CID
	notte	n	night	TLL
Baltic
Lithuanian:	naktìs	n.fem	night	LRC
Latvian:	nakts	n.fem	night	LRC
Slavic
Old Church Slavonic:	noštь	n.fem	night	LRC
	noštьnъ	adj	nocturnal	LRC
Albanian
Albanian:	natë	n.fem	night	IEW
Hellenic
Greek:	νύκτωρ	adv	by night	LRC
	νύξ, νύκτος	n.fem	night	LRC

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
adj	=	adjective
adv	=	adverb(ial)
arch	=	archaic
fem	=	feminine (gender)
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
neut	=	neuter (gender)
pfx	=	prefix
prop	=	proper
trans	=	transitive
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)
CDC	=	W.D. Whitney and B.E. Smith: The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia (1889-1911)
CID	=	Cassell's Italian Dictionary (1958)
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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