Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/bōkō

This Proto-Germanic entry contains reconstructed terms and roots. As such, the term(s) in this entry are not directly attested, but are hypothesized to have existed based on comparative evidence.

Proto-Germanic

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂ǵosder.

Proto-Germanic *bōkō

From Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂ǵos (“beech”). The Indo-European root is also the source of Ancient Greek φηγός (phēgós, “oak”) and Latin fāgus (“beech”).^[1]

The origin of the senses in Gothic (“book, writing”) is unclear, but they may be transferred by conflation from *bōks f (see there for more), or both senses “beech” and “writing” may have been originally present in both words; in the latter case, *bōkō can safely be derived from *bōks in pre-Germanic.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /ˈbɔː.kɔː/

Noun

*bōkō f^[1]

beech
(East Germanic) writing, text, book
Synonym: *bōks

Inflection

Declension of *bōkō (ō-stem)
	singular	plural
nominative	*bōkō	*bōkôz
vocative	*bōkō	*bōkôz
accusative	*bōkǭ	*bōkōz
genitive	*bōkōz	*bōkǫ̂
dative	*bōkōi	*bōkōmaz
instrumental	*bōkō	*bōkōmiz

Related terms

*bōks

Descendants

Proto-West Germanic: *bōku
- Old English: bōc
  - Middle English: bok, boc, boke, book, booke, buk, buke
    - English: book (see there for further descendants)
    - Geordie English: buik, beuk
    - Scots: buik, beuk, buke, beuck
    - Yola: buke
- Old Frisian: bōk
  - West Frisian: boeck, boek
- Old Saxon: bōka
  - Middle Low German: bôke
    - Low German: Böök, Böke
    - Dutch Low Saxon: beuk
      - → Dutch: beuk
- Old Dutch: *buoka (in placenames)
  - Middle Dutch: boec
    - Dutch: boek (only in compounds and placenames, displaced by eastern beuk)
- Old High German: buohha, *buohhia, buocha
  - Middle High German: buoche (possibly conflated with descendant from *bōkō)
    - Alemannic German: Buech
    - German: Buche, Büche
    - Luxembourgish: Bich
    - Vilamovian: bih́łiḱ
Old Norse: bók
- Icelandic: bók f
- >? Icelandic: bæki, beyki
- Faroese: bók f
- Norwegian Nynorsk: bok f, bøk m or f
- Norwegian Bokmål: bøk m, bok m or f
- Old Swedish: bōk
  - Swedish: bok c
- Danish: bog, bøg c
Gothic: 𐌱𐍉𐌺𐌰 (bōka)

References

↑ ^1.0 ^1.1 Kroonen, Guus (2013) “*bōk(j)ō-”, in Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 11)‎^[1], Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, pages 71-2

[EDPG-1] 1.0 ^1.1 Kroonen, Guus (2013) “*bōk(j)ō-”, in Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 11)‎^[1], Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, pages 71-2

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