Cognate Set 4887 – Meaning: back

IE-CoR reference form:
tergum
IE-CoR reference language:
Latin
Ideophonic:
no
Parallel derivation:
no
Justification:
No certain etymology outside of Italic (cf. Ernout & Meillet 1985:686, de Vaan 2008:615).
Found in clades:
Italic
Revised by:
Matthew Scarborough
Found in 1 clade by 1 lexeme.
Language Lexeme Native script Phonetic Phonemic Notes
124   Latin tergum ˈterɡũ ˈterɡum gen. tergī.
References
  • Ernout, Alfred and Meillet, Antoine: 686
    S.v. Lat. tergum 'dos (de l'homme et des animaux)', no known etymology.
  • de Vaan, Michiel: 615`
    S.v. Lat. tergum 'back', interpreted in earlier literature (cf. [IEW](src-49) 1022-1027) as *terg-o- from a root *(s)ter- 'to be stiff' with a suffix *-g-, and the underlying assumption that tergum originally indicated the stiff hair on the back of animals. There is no evidence for this, so the etymology remains unclear.