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THE GRAPH.
Find a modern word—or search sideways through reconstructed roots, historical forms, meanings, languages, scholars, sources, claims, disputes, and witnesses.
WIKTIONARY VIA KAIKKI / WIKTEXTRACT
Imported dictionary evidence
These are source reports, not reviewed *SET-U ancestry. A list of templates or numbered etymologies is not an ancestor chain. Scholarly disagreements remain in the original source text.
35,981 English word records · 45,491 etymology sections in this online subset
PARTIAL ENGLISH COVERAGE · FULL CORPUS REMAINS LOCAL4 source sections across 1 headword matching “Root”. These are separate from the reviewed results below.
rootEnglish (en) · Etymology 1Source text
PIE word *wréh₂ds From Middle English rote, root, roote (“the underground part of a plant”), from late Old English rōt, from Old Norse rót (“root”), from Proto-Germanic *wrōts (“root”), from Proto-Indo-European *wréh₂ds (“root”); Doublet of wort, radish, and radix. Cognate with Scots ruit, rute (“root”), Danish rod (“root”), Faroese and Icelandic rót (“root”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish rot (“root”).
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗rootEnglish (en) · Etymology 1Source text
PIE word *wréh₂ds From Middle English rote, root, roote (“the underground part of a plant”), from late Old English rōt, from Old Norse rót (“root”), from Proto-Germanic *wrōts (“root”), from Proto-Indo-European *wréh₂ds (“root”); Doublet of wort, radish, and radix. Cognate with Scots ruit, rute (“root”), Danish rod (“root”), Faroese and Icelandic rót (“root”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish rot (“root”).
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗rootEnglish (en) · Etymology 2Source text
From Middle English wrōten (“to dig with the snout”), from Old English wrōtan, from Proto-West Germanic *wrōtan, from Proto-Germanic *wrōtaną (“to dig out, to root”). Related to Old English wrōt (“snout; trunk”). Loss of initial w- probably due to influence from the related noun (Etymology 1).
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗rootEnglish (en) · Etymology 3Source text
Possibly an alteration of rout (“to make a loud noise”), influenced by hoot.
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗INDEPENDENT SOURCE LIBRARY
More sources for this spelling
These are spelling matches, not a claim of identical senses or agreement. Historical accounts retain their own editions and limits; none is automatically promoted into reviewed ancestry.
Chambers (1908)
1908- RootEnglish · e-38699-6826
Root, rōōt, n. the part of a plant which is fixed in the earth, and which draws up sap from the soil: an edible root: anything like a root, a growing plant together with its root: the bottom: a word from which others are
Read the full source record → - RootEnglish · e-38699-6827
Root, rōōt, v.t. to turn up with the snout.—v.i. to turn up the earth with the snout.—n. Root′er.—v.t. Root′le. [A.S. wrótan—wrót, a snout.]
Read the full source record →
0112
MODERN ENTRY POINTS
WORD DOSSIERS
onomastic compound elementhistorical form
-rīx
An attested Gaulish second member meaning “king” or “prince,” visible in compound personal names such as Dumnorix and Vercingetorix and inherited from Proto-Celtic *rīx-s.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗German masculine nouncontrarian claim
Freund
German Freund continues Middle High German vriunt and Old High German friunt. DWDS/Pfeifer, Duden, and Grimm independently analyze the inherited Germanic formation as a substantivized present participle of the verb represented by Gothic frijōn and Old English frēogan: historically a loving or favorably disposed one. The record is semantically wider than a modern close companion: the historical dictionaries also document neighbor, relative, lover, ally, supporter, patron, address, and euphemistic uses. The graph joins the High German line to the same reviewed *frijōnd- and *frī- nodes as English friend, keeps *prī- proposed, and stops.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗German masculine nouncontrarian claim
Hass
The modern German noun for intense aversion, rejection, or hostility toward a person, group, or institution. Duden traces Middle and Old High German haʒ to suffering, sorrow, and resentment and records the 1996 spelling change from Haß to Hass. DWDS/Pfeifer reports the Old High German noun from the eighth century and places it in the Germanic family of Old Saxon heti, Old English hete, Old Norse hatr, Gothic hatis, and related forms. Grimm’s DWB preserves a more complicated semantic record: hostile pursuit or action, anger expressed in deeds, ordinary hostile disposition, and even measured rivalry during friendly competition. The reviewed route reuses *hatiz- and the qualified *ḱh₂d-es- / *ḱeh₂d- comparison, then stops.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical form
Liebe
The German noun for love, inherited through Middle and Old High German and a Germanic abstract-noun formation distinct from the immediate noun ancestry of English love.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical form
adverb
A grammatical class commonly modifying verbs, adjectives, other adverbs, phrases, clauses, or sentences; the English term continues Latin adverbium.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗verbhistorical form
betroth
To promise in marriage; a Middle English prefixed formation built on the same historical noun that yielded truth and troth.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical form
boy
A male child or young man; Middle English also used the word for a male servant or churl, and its origin remains disputed.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nouncontrarian claim
bridegroom
A man about to be or recently married; remodeled from bridegome after the older man-word gome became opaque.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗adjectivehistorical form
chthonic
Of the underworld or of things in and under the earth; a learned English continuation of the Greek earth family.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗noun and adjectivehistorical form
dairy
Milk, milk products, or a place and enterprise devoted to them; historically built on the occupational word for a woman managing milk and food production.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗verb and adjectivehistorical form
direct
To guide, aim, command, or proceed without deviation or intermediary; continuing Latin dīrēctus and dīrigere through distinct medieval channels.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical form
disaster
A catastrophe whose name preserves an astrological model of misfortune: an unfavorable star.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗0212
ATTESTED / RECONSTRUCTED / BOUNDARY
HISTORICAL FORMS
*
Proto-Mississippi Valley Siouan / Siouan
*htí
dwell; dwelling root
- DATE
- Proto-Mississippi Valley Siouan
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Proto-Indo-European / Indo-European
*prī-
a proposed Indo-European root compared with the Germanic friend and free family
- DATE
- proposed Indo-European comparison
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 5
Proto-Dakota / Siouan
*thí
dwell; dwelling root
- DATE
- Proto-Dakota
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely reconstructed ancestor is represented beyond the star root.
- DATE
- before secure reconstruction
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely reviewed ancestor beyond the reconstructed desire-and-care root.
- DATE
- before secure reconstruction of *lewbʰ-
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely reviewed ancestor beyond the reconstructed desire-and-care root.
- DATE
- before secure reconstruction of *lewbʰ-
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely reviewed ancestor beyond the reconstructed desire-and-care root.
- DATE
- before secure reconstruction of *lewbʰ-
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely reviewed ancestor beyond the reconstructed desire-and-care root.
- DATE
- before secure reconstruction of *lewbʰ-
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No secure older ancestor is promoted beyond the salt root.
- DATE
- before the reconstructed salt family
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely promoted ancestor is known beyond the speaking root.
- DATE
- before the reviewed *werh₁- reconstruction
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely promoted ancestor is known beyond the speaking root.
- DATE
- before the reviewed *werh₁- reconstruction
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Beyond secure reconstruction
UNKNOWN
No securely promoted ancestor is known beyond the speaking root.
- DATE
- before the reviewed *werh₁- reconstruction
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
0324
WHERE INTERPRETATION IS TESTED
CLAIMS & DISPUTES
SCHOLARLY DISPUTES / 12
openproposedposition text
Is the deepest root *leǵ- or *sleǵ-?
The traditional *leǵ- reconstruction remains widely represented, while published scholarship argues that the gather or collect root began with *s. The graph preserves both analyses.
openproposedposition text
Do Celtic cais and Greek κῆδος prove that love and hate share one root?
No. They belong to a disputed wider comparison. Middle Irish cais carries a striking love-and-hatred field, but that does not make German Liebe an ancestor or cognate of Hass.
openproposedposition text
Is the deepest counting root *h₂rei- or *erei-dhmo- from *re-?
The references use different levels and notations: Merriam-Webster derives the Greek base through *h₂rei-, while Etymonline prints an expanded *erei-dhmo- formation tied to *re-.
openproposedposition text
Is the deepest brightness root *kand- or *(s)kend-?
The graph preserves both published analyses. The newer Merriam-Webster route uses *(s)kend- and explains candēre through a zero-grade stative formation; the prior *kand- route remains proposed.
openproposedposition text
Is *kand- a secure endpoint?
No. The Latin candēre family is attested, but its deeper reconstructed root and cognate set remain analysis-dependent.
openproposedposition text
Is *leǵ- the only published deepest root shape?
No. The traditional *leǵ- analysis remains widely represented, while a published *sleǵ- reconstruction challenges the initial consonant and cautions against a simple semantic tale.
openproposedposition text
Can the movement family be pushed securely beyond *meue-?
Not from the reviewed evidence. Etymonline publishes *meue- for the movement root, but this dossier does not promote an older form without specialist comparative review.
openproposedposition text
Does friend securely descend from exactly *prī-?
It is a published Indo-European comparison, not direct attestation. The Germanic and Old English stages are firmer than the deepest displayed root.
openproposedposition text
Was pursue the securely recovered basic meaning of the root?
No consensus is established. DWB calls hostile pursuit or persecution original inside the German history, while Pokorny’s account explicitly says the Germanic facts do not establish pursue as the root’s basic meaning.
openproposedposition text
Does *ghos-ti- descend from *ǵhes- “take, give in exchange”?
A deeper exchange root has been proposed, but Merriam-Webster labels the analysis hypothetical and the other reviewed root references stop at *ghos-ti-.
openproposedposition text
Is *leǵ- the only published root shape behind intelligent?
No. The traditional *leǵ- analysis remains probable, while *sleǵ- is a published alternative. Neither reconstructed shape is treated as an attested word.
openprobableposition text
Does the root prove that reading is “gathering letters”?
No. Latin legere covers gathering, selecting, and reading, but the precise semantic steps cannot be recovered from a slogan alone.
CONTRARIAN TRUTHS / 12
RANK 4GRADE Aranked reveal
Humility is an earth-and-lowness metaphor.
Latin humus “ground” produced humilis “low,” then humilitās “lowness,” before the moral virtue.
RANK 5GRADE Aranked reveal
Calculation began with a pebble in the hand.
Latin calculus was a small stone used for reckoning before calculation became abstract.
RANK 8GRADE Aranked reveal
Etymology calls itself the “true account.”
Greek ἔτυμος “true, real” joined -λογία “account or study”; even that truth-word reaches a reconstructed root.
RANK 13GRADE Aranked reveal
Legislation came before legislate.
The noun preserves a Latin law-bearing or law-proposing compound. English legislate was later back-formed from the already existing noun family.
RANK 20GRADE Aranked reveal
King is a kin-word, not a royal word.
English king continues Old English cyning and Germanic *kuninga-, built on the kin or lineage base *kunja-. Latin rēx, royal, and regal belong to a different root—and even “leader of the kin” overstates the disputed original Germanic sense.
RANK 22GRADE Aranked reveal
Kind is not kin with a d—and kindness did not begin as niceness.
Kind and kin descend through separate Germanic formations and meet only at the deeper birth root. The adjective first carries natural, native, fitting, and proper senses; benevolence becomes prominent through later semantic development.
RANK 23GRADE Aranked reveal
The d in kindred is an intruder—and kind is not in the word.
Kindred is kin plus a fossilized native element meaning a condition or state. One branch reaches the birth root; the other reaches a fit-together root. The modern d arrived between n and r after the compound already existed.
RANK 24GRADE Aranked reveal
Hatred is medieval—and its -red means neither red nor “more.”
Middle English assembled hate with a dying native element for a state or condition. The compound is younger than its parts; below the secure Germanic hate family, even the celebrated PIE root remains a qualified and semantically difficult proposal.
RANK 46GRADE Aranked reveal
Old High German hazzōn is a paradigm fault line, not proof that hate originally meant pursue.
The clean dictionary headword conceals paired ēn and ōn forms: Starling reports hazzēn in the eighth century and hazzōn in the ninth, Duden prints haʒʒēn and haʒʒōn, and the UT reflex index also records hazēn and hazōn. Corpus-wide research confirms that Old High German ēn verbs can show ōn double forms. DWB reports aemulari and insequi alignments that support emulation, following, or hostile pursuit—but Pokorny’s comparative warning is exact: Germanic evidence does not prove that pursue was the root’s basic meaning. The normalized form, the source-reported tokens, the paradigm analysis, and the prehistoric semantic claim are four different evidence layers.
RANK 50GRADE Aranked reveal
The hostile adjective may belong to whet and threat, not hate—and its starred lemma still has a nominative.
Köbler's Old Saxon entry reports five written readings at three Heliand loci, including nominative hotie, huotia, and huoti, yet heads the entry hōti*. The asterisk therefore cannot be explained away as “no nominative survives.” More radically, the sources split at the root. UT groups hōti with hatōn and heti under the inherited hate etymon k̑ād-. Köbler's same entry cross-references hatōn but reconstructs a different *hwōtja- adjective beside *hwōtō “threat” and Pokorny's *kʷē̆d- / *kʷō̆d- family of boring, pricking, sharpening, whetting, and inciting. Munich hotie and hotean are directly visible in contexts of hostile minds and hostile intent; Cotton huotia, huotian, and huoti remain source-reported. The unveiling is not “hostility secretly means sharpened hate.” It is that rigorous etymology sometimes reveals two irreconcilable maps where a flat dictionary would print one arrow.
RANK 52GRADE Aranked reveal
Friend and fiend are grammatical twins—but not cognates.
OED analyzes friend as a noun use of the present participle behind the Germanic free and love family, and it explicitly calls fiend a similar formation. Bosworth–Toller makes the Old English structure visible: freónd is the loving participle of freón, to free or love. The enemy word follows a different hate verb. The real unveiling is structural: one inherited agent noun is the loving one, the other the hating one or enemy, and parallel grammar must not be mistaken for one root splitting into moral opposites.
RANK 53GRADE Aranked reveal
Freund fossilizes the loving one—but it does not come from Freude.
Pfeifer, Duden, and Grimm route Freund through Middle High German vriunt and Old High German friunt to a substantivized Germanic present participle of the love verb. Grimm also makes the structural contrast explicit: Feind is built on a different hate verb. The unveiling is grammatical rather than mystical—Freund and Feind look like a moral pair because both preserve agent-noun architecture, not because one ancient root split into love and hate.
0412
BOOKS / DICTIONARIES / ARTICLES / DATABASES
SOURCES
scholarly reference72 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root reg-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference60 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root: dhghem-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference48 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root: dheigh-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference43 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root deru-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference37 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root genə-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference33 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root ghos-ti-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference25 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root dekm̥
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference18 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root mūs-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2026
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference17 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root wer-5
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference10 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root skei-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗research database7 CLAIM LINKS
American Heritage Dictionary Indo-European Roots Appendix
Calvert Watkins · American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2011
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗scholarly reference7 CLAIM LINKS
Indo-European Root: dhē(i)-
Calvert Watkins and American Heritage Dictionary Editors / 2022
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗050
FIRST USES & HISTORICAL OBJECTS
ATTESTATION WITNESSES
No reviewed record in this collection contains “root.” Absence describes this graph, not all of linguistic scholarship.
06
SEARCH IS DISCOVERY, NOT PROOF
EVERY RESULT OPENS A PERMANENT EVIDENCE RECORD.
Matching text only locates a record. It does not raise confidence, settle a dispute, establish cognacy, or turn a source report into direct inspection. Follow the result into its citations and editorial limits.