bethu

• beothu, bethad

From Proto-Celtic *biwotūts (compare Welsh bywyd), from *biwos from Proto-Indo-European *gʷih₃wós (“alive”) (compare Latin vīta, Ancient Greek βίοτος (bíotos), Old Church Slavonic животъ (životŭ, “life”), Lithuanian gyvatà (“life”), Sanskrit जीवित (jīvitá), Avestan 𐬔𐬀𐬌𐬌𐬊 (gaiio, “life”) accusative 𐬘𐬌𐬌𐬁𐬙𐬎𐬨 (jiiātum)), from *gʷeyh₃- (“to live”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈbʲeθu/

bethu m

1. life
   • c. 800, Würzburg Glosses on the Pauline Epistles, published in Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 499–712, Wb. 3^c2

     tri chretim i nÍsu ꝉ isin beothu i táa Ísu iar n-esséirgu

     through belief in Jesus or in the life in which Jesus is after resurrection

   • c. 800, Würzburg Glosses on the Pauline Epistles, published in Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 499–712, Wb. 15^b28

     A mbás tíagme-ni do·áirci bethid dúibsi .i. is ar bethid dúibsi tíagmi-ni bás.

     The death to which we go causes life to you pl, i.e. it is for the sake of life to you that we go to death.

• Middle Irish: betha
  • Irish: beatha
  • Manx: bea
  • Scottish Gaelic: beatha

• Gregory Toner, Sharon Arbuthnot, Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, Marie-Luise Theuerkauf, Dagmar Wodtko, editors (2019), “betha”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language