GRAPH-WIDE SEARCH
MEASURE THE GRAPH ↗NOT JUST A DICTIONARY LOOKUP
6 EVIDENCE COLLECTIONSSEARCH
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 LOCAL1 source section across 1 headword matching “Se”. These are separate from the reviewed results below.
seEnglish (en) · Unnumbered etymologySource text
From Mandarin 瑟 (sè).
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.
Mayhew–Skeat (1888)
1888; pinned HTML transcription updated October 28, 2024- SeMiddle English · word_se_pron
Se, pron. dem. m. and def. art. m. that, the, S. Comb.: se þe, that man that, he who, S; se þet, he that, S.—AS. se. Cf. Seo. Source markup note (transcriber annotation; text “Seo”): headword spelled ‘Sheo‘
Read the full source record → - SeMiddle English · word_se_conj
Se, so, as, S; see Swa.
Read the full source record → - SeMiddle English · word_se_sb_1
Se, sb. sea; see See.
Read the full source record → - SeMiddle English · word_se_sb_2
Se, sb. see; see See.
Read the full source record →
0112
MODERN ENTRY POINTS
WORD DOSSIERS
verb, adjectiveheadword prefix
select
To choose or mark out from a group, borrowed from Latin selectus and seligere, literally gathering apart.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗adjectivehistorical-form prefix
etymological
Of, relating to, or based on etymology; an Early Modern English adjective whose exact formation is described differently by major historical dictionaries.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical-form prefix
etymologist
A specialist in etymology; an English agent noun formed on etymology with -ist.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗verbhistorical-form prefix
etymologize
To discover, formulate, state, or study etymologies; an English verb formed from etymology with -ize.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical-form prefix
etymology
The study of the true or original sense of a word—and of the changes that made it what it is.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical-form prefix
etymon
A technical English noun for an earlier source form, a foreign donor, or a base used in composition or derivation.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical-form prefix
salary
Fixed compensation, inherited through French from a Latin term associated with salt.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗noun · verb · adjectivehistorical-form prefix
salt
Common salt and the wider family of saline substances and figurative savor; an inherited Germanic word in a deep Indo-European salt family.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical-form prefix
étymologie
The French word for the study or historical explanation of word origins, attested in medieval forms long before its modern scientific scope stabilized.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗adjectivehistorical-form prefix
étymologique
A French adjective meaning either related to etymology or conforming to a word’s origin, borrowed from Latin etymologicus.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounhistorical-form prefix
étymon
A French linguistic term for an attested or reconstructed form used to explain the historical development of one or more words.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗adjective · adverbhistorical-form prefix
ստոյգ
The classical Armenian word for true, certain, real, or genuine, compared by Indo-European etymologists with the Greek true-word family.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗0212
ATTESTED / RECONSTRUCTED / BOUNDARY
HISTORICAL FORMS
*
Proto-Indo-European / Indo-European
*set-eu-o-
having or containing true order; real
- DATE
- Proto-Indo-European adjectival formation, proposed
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Proto-Indo-European / Indo-European
*set-u-
true; real; in true order
- DATE
- prehistoric
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 12
Proto-Indo-European / Indo-European
*setu-mo-
true, real
- DATE
- Proto-Indo-European formation, proposed
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 7
Proto-Indo-European / Indo-European
*séh₂l-
salt
- DATE
- c. 4500–2500 BCE
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 2
Old English / Indo-European
sealt
salt, sodium chloride, condiment, or preservative
- DATE
- Old English
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Present-Day English / Indo-European
select
to choose from a group; chosen for value or fitness
- DATE
- 1565–today
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Latin / Indo-European
selectus
selected, chosen
- DATE
- Latin antiquity
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Latin / Indo-European
seligere
to select or choose apart
- DATE
- Latin antiquity
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Proto-Siouan / Siouan
*ahtí•
dwell, dwelling, house
- DATE
- Proto-Siouan prehistory
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Choctaw / Muskogean
*bayok
proposed early Choctaw form for a bayou or watercourse
- DATE
- proposed early Choctaw
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Proto-Germanic / Indo-European
*daigjōn-
female baker or servant
- DATE
- Proto-Germanic
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Middle Chinese (reconstructed reading) / Sino-Tibetan
*drae
tea; name of a plant
- DATE
- Middle Chinese reconstruction
- MATCH
- language
- DOSSIERS
- 5
0324
WHERE INTERPRETATION IS TESTED
CLAIMS & DISPUTES
SCHOLARLY DISPUTES / 12
resolvedestablishedword prefix
Is select descended from English lecture or lesson?
No. The English words are cousins. Select comes from Latin selectus and seligere; lecture and lesson take other Latin formations that independently reach legere.
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.
openprobableposition text
Did -rīx mean exactly “king” in every compound name?
Not necessarily. The king or prince value is secure for the element, but scholarship distinguishes names where it is determinative from analyses in which it is semantically bleached or intensifying. Each host therefore requires its own compositional claim.
openprobableposition text
Did English receive December through Old English or French?
The reviewed source allows either Old English or Anglo-French transmission from Latin and does not choose between them.
openprobableposition text
Is the exact phonetic shape of *fi(j)and- directly known?
No. The form is a comparative reconstruction. Optional j notation, branch vowels, and the relation of written historical variants require analysis rather than direct Proto-Germanic observation.
openproposedposition text
Is the deepest *peh₁- route established?
No. The Germanic verb and lexicalized agent formation are firmer than the proposed Indo-European comparison, whose formal intermediates and semantic unity remain reconstructive.
openproposedposition text
Does Freund securely descend from exactly *prī-?
The comparison is published on the shared friend-family route but remains proposed and less secure than the Germanic formation.
openprobableposition text
Was the relative sense inherited or independently strengthened in Germanic branches?
The sources establish the sense across German and Nordic evidence but do not recover one complete prehistoric semantic tree.
openproposedposition text
Was the original meaning hostile pursuit or suffering and sorrow?
Unresolved. DWB argues for hostile pursuit or persecution as the original center; Duden glosses the origin as suffering, sorrow, and resentment; DWDS foregrounds hostile disposition, resentment, and enmity.
openprobableposition text
Does Hass securely descend from *ḱeh₂d-?
Only as a qualified proposal. Formal correspondence is published, but the semantic chain through grief, care, pain, pursuit, and hatred is not transparent.
openboundaryposition text
Can aguacate be securely pushed deeper than āhuacatl?
Not from the reviewed sources. The institutional dictionaries reach the Nahuatl word and its historical witnesses but do not establish a deeper lexical ancestor.
openprobableposition text
Does the English record begin in the 13th or 14th century?
The reviewed reports differ. Etymonline gives an early-thirteenth-century algorism; Merriam-Webster gives a fourteenth-century first-known-use horizon.
CONTRARIAN TRUTHS / 12
RANK 208GRADE A-ranked-word prefix
To select is to gather apart.
Latin seligere combines se- “apart” with legere “gather, select.” The same gathering verb sits behind lecture, lesson, legend, and collect.
RANK 1GRADE Aranked reveal
A stranger became both guest and enemy.
The reciprocal outsider behind guest and host also became Latin hostis, “enemy.”
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 6GRADE Aranked reveal
Evidence became a thread you could follow.
Old English cliewen was a ball of thread; the labyrinth metaphor turned it into guidance through uncertainty.
RANK 7GRADE Acontrarian claim
Nice crossed from ignorance to approval.
Latin nescius “ignorant” became foolish or wanton, then fastidious and precise, and finally pleasant or kind.
RANK 8GRADE Acontrarian claim
Etymology calls itself the “true account.”
Greek ἔτυμος “true, real” joined -λογία “account or study”; even that truth-word reaches a reconstructed root.
RANK 9GRADE Aranked reveal
The most repeated origin story is not the most rigorous answer.
Mapuche ancestry is a serious, evidenced proposal—but current RAE and a historical Spanish argument keep the deeper source genuinely open.
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 15GRADE Aranked reveal
The modern stigma of Weib is not the timeless nature of wīb.
Duden marks modern Weib increasingly discriminatory, while Old High German records preserve wīb in old-woman and wife expressions; the deeper origin remains unresolved.
RANK 16GRADE Aranked reveal
Humiliation is evidenced in English before humiliate.
Chaucer’s Middle English humiliacioun occurs in a humility passage; Merriam-Webster reports the English verb humiliate only circa 1534. Christian Latin and French preserve lowering, abasement, mortification, and self-humbling before current definitions center degradation, disgrace, and shame.
RANK 17GRADE Aranked reveal
-logy never simply meant “the study of.”
The bound form’s recorded range includes expression and discourse as well as doctrine, theory, science, and study. Its trail reaches Greek logos—word, speech, account, reckoning, reason—rather than a prehistoric word meaning “science.”
RANK 19GRADE Aranked reveal
The x of rēx is a whole nominative sound change in one letter.
Latin starts from the bound stem rēg-, adds nominative -s, devoices g to k, and writes the resulting /ks/ as x. Genitive rēgis makes the stem visible—but it is a sibling case form, not an ancestor.
0412
BOOKS / DICTIONARIES / ARTICLES / DATABASES
SOURCES
historical dictionary10 CLAIM LINKS
Select — Definition and Word History
Merriam-Webster Editors / 2026
title prefixAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary102 CLAIM LINKS
Hate — definition, etymology, and first known use
Merriam-Webster Editors / 2026
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary91 CLAIM LINKS
Oxford English Dictionary — fiend, n., revised 2026
Oxford English Dictionary Editors / 2026
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗research article59 CLAIM LINKS
On the syntax of the Agent nouns in Gothic: the case of nd-formations
Daniel Ayora Estevan / 2023
publisherAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary48 CLAIM LINKS
Oudnederlands Woordenboek — fīunt
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal editorial team / 2009
author or editorAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary38 CLAIM LINKS
Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch — fîant, fîjant
Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch editorial team
publisherAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary35 CLAIM LINKS
Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch — fîên
Althochdeutsches Wörterbuch editorial team
publisherAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary35 CLAIM LINKS
Bosworth–Toller Anglo-Saxon Dictionary — FEÓGAN
Joseph Bosworth · Thomas Northcote Toller · Christ Sean · Ondřej Tichý / 2014
author or editorAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary32 CLAIM LINKS
Deutsches Wörterbuch von Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Grimm — hassen
Jacob Grimm · Wilhelm Grimm · DWDS editorial team / 2026
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗etymological dictionary31 CLAIM LINKS
Etymologisch Woordenboek van het Nederlands — vijand
Marlies Philippa · Frans Debrabandere · Arend Quak · Tanneke Schoonheim · Nicoline van der Sijs / 2009
publisherAUDIT EVERY USE ↗etymological dictionary28 CLAIM LINKS
Etymologisch Woordenboek van het Nederlands — vriend
Marlies Philippa · Frans Debrabandere · Arend Quak · Tanneke Schoonheim · Nicoline van der Sijs / 2009
publisherAUDIT EVERY USE ↗contemporary dictionary27 CLAIM LINKS
Den Danske Ordbog — fjende
Den Danske Ordbogs redaktion
publisherAUDIT EVERY USE ↗0512
FIRST USES & HISTORICAL OBJECTS
ATTESTATION WITNESSES
DIRECTLY INSPECTEDprinted book
John Harris’s NOTES in Musick entry describes a fixed group of six select syllables formerly used to distinguish degrees of sound.
select / select / 1704
Lexicon technicum: or, an universal English dictionary of arts and sciencesattested-form prefix / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexicographic first use
Merriam-Webster source-reported Old English record
sealt / salt / before the 12th century
Salt — Definition, Word History, and First Known Useattested-form prefix / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexicographic first use
Merriam-Webster first-known-use record for select
select / select / First known adjective use reported as 1565
Select — Definition and Word Historyattested-form prefix / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Seventeenth-century figurative tree-enemy use
fiende / fiende / 1651
Svenska Akademiens ordbok — FIENDEwitness-title prefix / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Seventeenth-century hidden-enemy proverb
fiende / fiende / 1665
Svenska Akademiens ordbok — FIENDEwitness-title prefix / OPEN RECORD ↗DIRECTLY INSPECTEDmanuscript
Codex Argenteus, Luke 1:71
hatan / hatan / early 6th century
Codex Argenteus facsimile 145 — folio 123r, Luke 1:69–77witness excerpt / OPEN RECORD ↗DIRECTLY INSPECTEDmanuscript
Codex Argenteus, John 7:7
fijan / fijan / early 6th century
Codex Argenteus facsimile 57 — folio 33r, John 7:2–8witness excerpt / OPEN RECORD ↗DIRECTLY INSPECTEDmanuscript
Codex Argenteus, John 12:25
fijan / fijan / early 6th century
Codex Argenteus facsimile 96 — folio 76v, John 12:19–25witness excerpt / OPEN RECORD ↗DIRECTLY INSPECTEDmanuscript
Codex Argenteus, Luke 1:71
fijan / fijan / early 6th century
Codex Argenteus facsimile 145 — folio 123r, Luke 1:69–77witness excerpt / OPEN RECORD ↗DIRECTLY INSPECTEDmanuscript
Heliand manuscript M, Beatitudes persecution clause
heti / heti / Heliand composition circa 830–840; Munich manuscript second half of the ninth century
Heliand — BSB Cgm 25, scan 41, folio 20r, heti locusreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗DIRECTLY INSPECTEDprinted book
The first edition of the Académie française dictionary prints DESASTRE as a headword and defines it as a disastrous accident or misfortune.
désastre / disaster / 1694
Le dictionnaire de l'Académie française. Tome 1 (A–L), première éditionreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗DIRECTLY INSPECTEDprinted book
The first edition of the Académie française dictionary prints HOSTEL as a headword in the historical French family later normalized as hôtel.
hôtel / hotel / 1694
Le dictionnaire de l'Académie française. Tome 1 (A–L), première éditionreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗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.