ālium

Meaning

1. garlic, onion

Declension

Origins

Unknown according to De Vaan (2008). May be connected to āla (“wing”), on the image of the garlic bulb being divided into "wings"; for a similar derivation from garlic being "cloven" cf. the etymology of German Knoblauch (“garlic”). It has also been compared with the Greek gloss of ἄλλην (állēn) as 'vegetables' "among the Italians", which may stem from another Italic language, and if so, has no direct bearing on the etymological consideration of Latin ālium. Based only on the form allium, Kroonen (2012) suggests that it may be a borrowing from the root of Ancient Greek ἄγλις (áglis), specifically via a byform *adlī-. See the Ancient Greek entry for more. This assumption of Proto-Italic *alljom agrees with Ancient Greek ἀλλᾶς (allâs, “sausage”) (plural ἀλλᾶντες (allântes)), which could reflect earlier *αλλᾱϝεντ- (*allāwent-, “sausage seasoned with garlic”), a derivation from the Italic stem *all- with Proto-Hellenic *-wénts (though this suffix is regularly reflected in Greek as -(ϝ)εις (-(w)eis)). According to Roberts, from Proto-Indo-European *ālu- (“bitter plant”).

In English words that came into English from ālium

• alliaceousallium
• allicinallium
• alliinallium