Etymology

death

D2E1A1T1H4

Today it means: The cessation of life and all associated processes; the end of an organism's existence as an entity independent from its environment and its return to an inert, non-living state. Full definition →

Middle English deth ← Old English dēaþ ← Proto-West Germanic *dauþu
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European · inherited from*dʰówtus
  2. Proto-Germanic · inherited from*dauþuz
  3. Proto-West Germanic · inherited from*dauþu
  4. Old English · inherited fromdēaþ
  5. Middle English · inherited fromdeth
  6. English todaydeath

From Middle English deth, deeth, from Old English dēaþ, from Proto-West Germanic *dauþu, from Proto-Germanic *dauþuz, from Proto-Indo-European *dʰówtus. More at die. Cognates Cognate with Scots daeth, daith, death, deeth, deith (“death”), North Frisian Duar, duas, düüs (“death”), Saterland Frisian Dood (“death”), West Frisian dea (“death”), Dutch dood (“death”), German Tod, Todt (“death”), Limburgish doead (“death”), Luxembourgish Doud (“death”), Yiddish טויט (toyt, “death”), Danish and Norwegian Bokmål død (“death”), Faroese deyði (“death”), Icelandic dauði (“death”), Norwegian Nynorsk daude, død (“death”), Swedish död (“death”), Gothic 𐌳𐌰𐌿𐌸𐌿𐍃 (dauþus, “death”).

Words from the same roots

Old Englishdēaþ all →

Dethick

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.