Etymology

relinquish

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Today it means: To give up, abandon or retire from something; to trade away. Full definition →

Middle English relinquisshen ← Middle French relinquir ← Old French relenquir
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The story

  1. Proto-Italic*wre-
  2. Latinre-
  3. Proto-Indo-European*leykʷ-
  4. Proto-Indo-European*linékʷti
  5. Proto-Italic*linkʷō
  6. Latinlinquō
  7. Latinrelinquō
  8. Old Frenchrelenquir
  9. Middle Frenchrelinquir
  10. Middle Englishrelinquisshen
  11. English todayrelinquish

From Middle English relinquisshen, from the inflected stem relinquiss- of Middle French relinquir, from Latin relinquere, itself from re- + linquere (“to leave”). Compare also Sanskrit रिणक्ति (riṇakti, “to leave”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.