liquidate

The story

1. Proto-Indo-European*wleykʷ-
2. Proto-Indo-European*wlikʷéh₁yeti
3. Proto-Italic*(w)likʷēō
4. Latinliqueō
5. Proto-Indo-European*dʰeh₁-
6. Classical Latinliquidus
7. Late Latinliquidō
8. Late Latinliquidātu
9. English todayliquidate

Learned borrowing from Late Latin liquidātus (“liquid, clear”), perfect passive participle of liquidō (“to turn into a liquid, melt; to make clear”), from Latin liquidus (“fluid, liquid; clear, transparent”) + -ō (suffix forming regular first-conjugation verbs); the former from liqueō (“to be fluid or liquid; to be clear or transparent”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *wleykʷ- (“to make wet”)) + -idus (adjective-forming suffix). By surface analysis, liquid (adjective) + -ate. Verb sense 1.2.3 (“to kill; to abolish”) is a semantic loan from Russian ликвиди́ровать (likvidírovatʹ); while verb sense 1.2.4 and verb sense 2 (business-related senses) were influenced by French liquider and Italian liquidare, all ultimately from Latin liquidus.

Words from the same roots