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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: seng^u̯h- 'to sing'

Semantic Field: to Sing

Indo-European Reflexes:

Family/Language	Reflex(es)	PoS/Gram.	Gloss	Source(s)
Celtic
Welsh:	de(h)ongli	vb	to explain	LRC
English
Old English:	sang/song	n.masc	song, poetry	ASD
	singan, sang, sungon, sungen	vb.str.III	to sing, recite, compose	LRC
Middle English:	singen	vb	to sing	W7
	song	n	song	W7
English:	Meistersinger	prop.n	master of 14th-16th century German guild cultivating traditions of medieval Minnesingers	W7
	minnesinger	n	German lyric poet/musician of 12th-14th centuries	AHD/W7
	sing, sang, sung	vb.str	to produce music via voice	AHD/W7
	singspiel	n	comic/dramatic German musical/dialogue work	AHD/W7
	song	n	act/art of singing	AHD/W7
W-Germanic
Old Frisian:	singa	vb	to sing	ASD
	song	n	song	ASD
Dutch:	zingen	vb	to sing	LRC
Old Saxon:	sang	n	song	ASD
	singan	vb	to sing	LRC
Old High German:	sang	n	song	ASD
	singan	vb	to sing, recite	W7
Middle High German:	meistersinger	n.masc	Meistersinger, lit. master-singer	W7
	minnesinger	n.masc	minnesinger, courtly love singer	W7
	singer	n.masc	singer	W7
German:	Meistersinger	n.masc	Meistersinger	W7
	Minnesinger	n.masc	minnesinger	W7
	singen	vb	to sing	W7
	singspiel	n.neut	singspiel	W7
N-Germanic
Old Norse:	syngja/syngva	vb	to sing	LRC
Icelandic:	syngva	vb	to sing, ring, whistle	ASD
	söngr	n	song	ASD
Danish:	synge	vb	to sing	LRC
Swedish:	sjunga	vb	to sing	LRC
E-Germanic
Gothic:	saggws	n	song	ASD
	siggwan	vb.str.III	to sing	GED
Crimean Gothic:	singhen	vb	to sing	CGo
Hellenic
Hesychius' Greek Lexicon:	ζίγγος	n	humming of bees	LRC
Homeric Greek:	ὀμφή	n.fem	voice of a god/goddess	LRC
Indic
Prakrit:	saṃghai	vb	to say, teach	LRC

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

Abbrev.		Meaning
III	=	class 3
fem	=	feminine (gender)
masc	=	masculine (gender)
n	=	noun
neut	=	neuter (gender)
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)
CGo	=	MacDonald Stearns, Jr: Crimean Gothic (1978)
GED	=	Winfred P. Lehmann: A Gothic Etymological Dictionary (1986)
LRC	=	Linguistics Research Center, University of Texas, Austin
W7	=	Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1963)

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