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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.
014
MODERN ENTRY POINTS
WORD DOSSIERS
adjectiveexact headword
candid
Open or frank in modern English, inherited through French and Latin from a family of brightness and whiteness.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗nounheadword prefix
candidate
A person seeking selection or office; ultimately the Roman office-seeker dressed in a bright white toga.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗Gothic class-III weak-verb lemmadossier summary
fijan
A Gothic class-III weak verb conventionally glossed hate or detest. Project Wulfila currently exposes 42 candidate tokens under fijan: 13 verified, eight further lexically unambiguous, and 21 explicitly ambiguous with the masculine nd-stem noun fijands, enemy. The surface inventory contains fifteen written shapes, including one exact infinitive fijan in John 7:7 and four j-less forms. Ayora Estevan shows why the overlap cannot be normalized away: Proto-Germanic had already lexicalized *fi(j)and- as enemy, while Gothic still used the matching present-participial formation for one who hates.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗Gothic masculine nd-stem common noundossier summary
fijands
A Gothic masculine nd-stem noun conventionally glossed enemy. Project Wulfila currently exposes 26 candidates: three verified noun assignments, two further noun-only assignments, and 21 surface forms also listed under the living verb fijan. Ayora Estevan explains the collision diachronically: Proto-Germanic had already lexicalized the present-participial *fi(j)and- as enemy, while Gothic retained productive one-who-hates participles beside the noun. The five noun-only candidates use fiand, fijands, fijande, and fijandis; all five were inspected in Codex Argenteus facsimiles.
OPEN THE FULL LINEAGE ↗026
ATTESTED / RECONSTRUCTED / BOUNDARY
HISTORICAL FORMS
●
Present-Day English / Indo-European
candid
open, frank, honest; originally white in English
- DATE
- 1597–today
- MATCH
- exact historical form
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Present-Day English / Indo-European
candidate
a person seeking office, selection, or appointment
- DATE
- c. 1600–today
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Middle French / Indo-European
candide
brilliant; favorably disposed
- DATE
- Middle French, c. 1300–1600
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Latin / Indo-European
candidus
bright white; shining; clear
- DATE
- Latin antiquity
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 2
Latin / Indo-European
candidātus
a person standing for office; the white-clad one
- DATE
- Roman antiquity
- MATCH
- historical-form prefix
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Dharawal / Pama-Nyungan
bou-mar-rang
returning boomerang; proposed source candidate
- DATE
- Dharawal source candidate
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 0
0316
WHERE INTERPRETATION IS TESTED
CLAIMS & DISPUTES
SCHOLARLY DISPUTES / 12
openproposedexact word
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.
resolvedestablishedexact word
Did candid always mean honest?
No. The first reported English sense is white; clear, pure, fair, honest, frank, and photographic senses develop later.
openprobableword prefix
Did candidates claim moral purity?
The whitened toga is historical and lexical. Reading it as a guaranteed moral-purity claim goes beyond what the word formation alone proves.
openproposedword prefix
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
Which Aboriginal language supplied boomerang?
Dharug bumarin and a Dharawal bou-mar-rang form are published candidates, but the Australian National Dictionary Centre says the exact source language remains uncertain.
openprobableposition text
Can the nd-ending alone distinguish enemy from one who hates?
No. The noun and productive participle share surface inflection. Case, complementation, agreement, and context resolve some passages, but Project Wulfila leaves 21 candidates lexically and morphosyntactically ambiguous.
openprobableposition text
Does the Luke lexical swap resolve the remaining 21 noun-participle candidates?
No. Luke 1:71 and 6:27 show that fijan and hatan can exchange the work of enemies and those hating, but those two contextual alignments do not determine every other fijand- token.
resolvedestablishedposition text
Does the surviving corpus contain 42 secure verb tokens?
No. Project Wulfila exposes 42 candidates under fijan, but only 13 are verified, eight more are lexically unambiguous but unverified, and 21 are explicitly shared with the fijands noun inventory.
resolvedestablishedposition text
Is the infinitive fijan itself written?
Yes, once in the current inventory: John 7:7 writes fijan. The other 41 candidates are inflected forms, and fian is a normalized variant redirect rather than a separately inventoried exact infinitive token.
resolvedestablishedposition text
Do 42 candidate tokens measure spoken Gothic frequency?
No. They measure a bounded, fragmentary textual corpus with duplicate manuscript witnesses, biblical translation effects, and unresolved lemma assignments.
resolvedestablishedposition text
Does the surviving corpus contain 26 secure noun tokens?
No. Project Wulfila exposes 26 candidates under fijands: three verified, two further noun-only but unverified, and 21 explicitly shared with the fijan verb inventory.
resolvedestablishedposition text
Do 26 candidates measure spoken Gothic frequency?
No. They measure a bounded fragmentary textual corpus with biblical translation effects, ambiguous lemma assignments, and duplicate manuscript witnesses.
CONTRARIAN TRUTHS / 4
RANK 186GRADE Aexact ranked word
Candid was white before it was honest.
English first records candid in the white sense. Brightness and unblemished clarity later support fairness, frankness, and honest expression.
RANK 210GRADE A−ranked-word prefix
A candidate was “dressed in white.”
Roman office-seekers signaled purity and visibility with a whitened toga.
RANK 32GRADE Aranked reveal
Enemy is a fossilized hater—but 21 Gothic tokens still refuse to choose.
Project Wulfila lists 42 candidates under fijan and 26 under the enemy noun fijands. Their intersection is exactly 21 surface tokens. Ayora Estevan explains the collision: *fi(j)and- had lexicalized as enemy before Gothic, while Gothic still possessed the productive present participle one who hates. Case and syntax resolve some passages; the remaining 21 stay public as noun-versus-participle ambiguity.
RANK 33GRADE Aranked reveal
Enemy is a fossilized hater—but lexicalization does not make every token transparent.
Project Wulfila lists 26 candidates under the Gothic enemy noun and 42 under the verb fijan; exactly 21 surface tokens belong to both inventories. Ayora Estevan explains why: Proto-Germanic had already lexicalized one who hates as enemy, while Gothic retained the productive participle. The five noun-only tokens are directly inspected; the 21-token overlap remains public instead of being counted twice as certainty.
047
BOOKS / DICTIONARIES / ARTICLES / DATABASES
SOURCES
historical dictionary13 CLAIM LINKS
Candid — Definition, Word History, and First Known Use
Merriam-Webster Editors / 2026
title prefixAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary2 CLAIM LINKS
Candidate — Word History
Merriam-Webster Editors / 2026
title prefixAUDIT EVERY USE ↗research database42 CLAIM LINKS
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventory
Project Wulfila editors · Wilhelm Streitberg / 2026
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗research database32 CLAIM LINKS
Lemma fijands — Gothic enemy noun and 26-token candidate inventory
Project Wulfila editors · Wilhelm Streitberg / 2026
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗lexical database5 CLAIM LINKS
Corpus of Latin Dictionaries: candidatus
Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗lexical database4 CLAIM LINKS
Logeion: candidus
Classics Department Editors
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗historical dictionary4 CLAIM LINKS
Étymologie: candidat / candidate
CNRTL Editors
source titleAUDIT EVERY USE ↗0512
FIRST USES & HISTORICAL OBJECTS
ATTESTATION WITNESSES
SOURCE REPORTEDlexicographic first use
Merriam-Webster lexicographic first-use record for candid
candid / candid / 1597
Candid — Definition, Word History, and First Known Useexact attested form / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Latin political and lexical record
candidātus / candidate / Roman antiquity
Corpus of Latin Dictionaries: candidatusattested-form prefix / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexicographic first use
English lexical record
candidate / candidate / c. 1600
Candidate — Word Historyattested-form prefix / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, Matthew 6:24
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 7:7
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 15:18
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 15:18
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 15:19
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 15:23
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 15:23
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 15:24
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting source / OPEN RECORD ↗SOURCE REPORTEDlexical corpus record
Codex Argenteus, John 15:25
fijan / fijan / early 6th-century witness, source-reported
Lemma fijan — Gothic dictionary and 42-token candidate inventoryreporting 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.