The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots

by Calvert Watkins (Editor)

A newly revised study of the history of the English language discusses the nature, origins, and development of language and lists the meanings and associated words for more than thirteen thousand Indo-European root words, accompanied by "Language and Culture" notes, background information about Proto-Indo-European culture, and reconstructed root words.

Genres: Reference, Language, Linguistics, Nonfiction, History, Dictionaries, Writing

149 pages, Hardcover

First published February 12, 1985

About the author

Calvert Watkins was an American linguist and philologist, known for his work in comparative Indo-European poetics. He was the Victor S. Thomas Professor of Linguistics and the Classics at Harvard University and later went to serve as Distinguished Professor in Residence of the Department of Classics and the Program in Indo-European Studies at UCLA.

Reviews

[Douglas Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay, I admit it. I do read dictionaries. This dictionary of Indo-European word roots was great, although the plot did drag a little by the P's.

[Jerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not actually read the dictionary. However, the book contains about thirty-four pages of introduction that go over the basics of what it means to be an Indo-European language, how proto-Indo-European roots are discovered, what the branches of Indo-European are, and what we know about the culture of the proto-Indo-Europeans. That was very interesting.

The dictionary portion consists of a series of entries in alphabetical order of proto-Indo-European roots; and then a cross-reference of English words and the root to look up for more information.

Because this is a subset of the American Heritage Dictionary, it does not contain all known roots, but only the ones that connect in some way to a word in the English language.

This is a fascinating book to browse through, so far. It could, however, do with a bit better editing. In the introductory pages, when talking about a root that is in the dictionary, that root is bolded. I didn’t follow up on most of them because I figured I could do that later. But one was marked as especially interesting:

The Germanic word for “woman” (WIFE) was completely isolated until a cognate was recently identified in Tocharian. For its curious semantic history, see ghwībh-.

Since it was specifically noted as more interesting than others, I looked it up. But as far as I can tell, there is no entry for ghwībh- in the dictionary. There is also no entry in the English cross-reference for woman or wife.

After that, I chose another couple of roots bolded in the introduction at random and looked them up, and did find them. It’s possible that I’m just not reading the “curious” reference correctly, but if that’s the case then the book probably needs a better organization for the layman.

It would also be nice if there were a better guide for the layman to the pronunciation of the symbols and letter combinations used in the dictionary.

But other than that, it’s fascinating. One of the more interesting charts is a table of how sounds in the original tongue have changed in various branches, allowing you to take a root and guess at what the word would be in the more modern language. The example given is of pәter- which would be pater in Latin, athir in Old Irish, and fadar in Common Germanic.

[Mjm · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the few truly indispensable books in my library. A must have for anyone interested in etymological musing.

[Joseph Leake]

Completely engrossing reference work. Part of the delight is in discovering words that are unexpectedly related, like "host" and "guest," "hostile" and "hospital," "squirrel" and "arse"; "Tuesday," "Jupiter," and "divine"; "daisy," "window," "inveigle," "ocular," and "optometry"; and many other surprises.

The other part of the delight is seeing the connections between language, thought, history, and culture. The link between "sit" and "nest" is obvious, once you know the two are related (also "seat" and "sedentary"); the link between "bite" and bait" is also intuitive, but that both are related to "fission" requires some explanation. (The underlying root of all three meant "to split"; "boat" is also part of this group -- you split wood to make one.) The words "chant," "hen," and "incantation" are all related -- the idea common to all is "to sing." Another group comprises "holster," "helmet," "hell," "cellar," "occult," and "apocalypse" -- the original shared root of all had to do with concealment, what is hidden or secret.

In short, a treasure hoard. There are two ways to use the book -- going to the appendix of English words in order to look up the background of a particular term you want to know more about; or to just simply browse through the glossary of roots and enjoy whatever rabbit trails it takes you down.

For those interested, the book also includes a terrific introduction to the subject of comparative historical linguistics; but one does not have to read this in order to use and enjoy the rest of the book.

[Christian Schwoerke · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Search of the Indo-Europeans—J.P. Mallory
American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots—Calvert Watkins

Both of these books offer a fascinating glimpse onto the dawning of civilized humankind, when skills of agronomy, animal husbandry, wheel technology, inter-community trade, and equine mastery all combined to poise humankind for literacy and the building in brick and stone our first ancient city-states circa 3000BC.

Half the world speaks a language that is descended from a single pre-historic language. Both Watkins and Mallory describe how in the late 18th century linguists observed that Sanskrit, ancient Greek, and Latin all appeared to have been descended from a common language. Linguists then determined which living and ancient languages were related by comparison of fundamental vocabularies (comprising the most basic nouns and verbs), then demonstrated how each language showed a systematic transformation in pronunciation/spelling. This historical linguistic/phonetic analysis gave linguists means to reverse-engineer an ur- or proto-language that was the mother of all the Indo-European languages. Further linguistic archeology led to establishing for the Proto Indo-Europeans a general geographic homeland, a culture, an ethos, a religion/mythology, and some general historic migratory patterns. Both authors present a sweeping picture of how linguistic archeology establishes a framework upon which traditional material archeology has been able to produce evidence of pre-historic communities whose physical remains corroborate and amplify who the Indo-Europeans must have been and where they might have hailed from.

While both authors assume that we readers know that writing itself only began in the late 3rd millennium BC, it’s important to bear in mind that pre-history is really synonymous with pre-literacy. I wish that—in the larger presentation of Mallory’s very good survey of all the theories and contributions to the hunt for an Indo-European people/homeland—more would have been made of this point, ie, that one can only know that a language existed by its being literally “spelled out” and that transformations in the daily use of the language are thereafter reflected in the written language. With that premise—that language is always changing in whatever community it is practiced—a reader can see how astounding it is that linguists have been able to look at all the ancient texts and made such a comprehensive analysis of how all these languages underwent historic and pre-historic/pre-literate changes.

While Watkins is content in the wide-ranging introduction to the Dictionary of Indo-European Roots to offer a summary picture of what is known of the Indo-Europeans, Mallory is more concerned with providing a more nuanced, ie, muddled, picture of what the evidence indicates. Archeologists have unearthed a number of different peoples inhabiting the regions around the Caspian and Black Seas, where they believe the Proto Indo-Europeans hailed (based on vocabularies that established flora/fauna, climate, and terrain concordances), and the muddle is furthered when it is obvious that different peoples shared the same sites at different times. Mallory does an excellent, technical description of the current different migratory theories, demonstrating to what extent they can align chronologically in order to explain eastern migrations into the mid-East and India, as well as western migrations that moved the Indo-European languages into southern and northern Europe. Because no single pre-historic people conclusively conform to all the evidence, there is speculation about an extensive, overlapping population that was interwoven via trade and the leadership afforded by a more dominant, mobile, horse-using people.

Mallory also addresses in a final chapter the sordid racism of the “Aryan myth” which was inaugurated in the late 19th century and reached its apogee with Hitler. As with Watkins’ preface to the dictionary, Mallory downplays the idea of blonde-haired warriors descending on dark native peoples in Asia and Europe. “Conquest” was more subtle and usually was a usurpation/interpolation at the highest levels of a native population, which did little to affect the day-to-day lives of a native population. The resulting social organization conformed to Greek, Indian, and Norse patriarchial religious pantheons which defined a ruling warrior culture/class and a priest/Brahmin class, both of which overtopped a peasant/farmer class (which population was assumed to be the mass of the native population).

The dictionary entries of Indo-European roots following Watkins’ historical survey demonstrate etymologically the extent to which English has its roots in Proto Indo-European. Each of the 600 or so (I’m guessing) entries reveals how our language still shows signs of its origins nearly 5000 years ago, when humankind was stumbling its way towards civilization.

[Opal Bellamy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have not finished reading the dictionary entries themselves, but my rating is for the excellent essay preceding them describing the basics of language reconstruction and how they connect with PIE. Very useful reading.

[Nihilgorath · Rating 4 out of 5]

I mean, it's a dictionary. I of course haven't exactly read it like you would with a normal book, but have rather thoroughly looked it through (and will continue to do so!).

[Kayla]

interesting

[Charlie Kester · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've often found this to be an impetus for philosophical reflection as well as a linguistic resource.