Etymology

y-

Today it means: Used with past participle conjugations to form past participles. Full definition →

Middle English y- ← Old English ġe- ← Proto-West Germanic *ga-
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*ḱe?
  2. Proto-Indo-European*ḱóm
  3. Proto-Germanic*ga-
  4. Proto-West Germanic*ga-
  5. Old Englishġe-
  6. Middle Englishy-
  7. English todayy-

Inherited from Middle English y-, from Old English ġe- (perfective and associative prefix); see those entries for more. Cognate with German ge-, Yiddish גע־ (ge-).

Words from the same roots

Old Englishġe- all →

a-i-

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.