iūniperus

Meaning

1. juniper-tree

Declension

Origins

Often connected to iūncus (“reed”). According to Brüch, after the form combrētum, the Latin expected form would be *iūniber, *iūnibrī. The form iūniperus, following him, is a pseudo-Latinism by Sabine speakers, who, themselves in the land of junipers as ancient relations and the terms for particular species catanum and herba Sabīna witness, have borrowed the original form from Umbrian, and knowing the Umbrian correspondence of br to pr and elision of vowels loaned the plant name in the shape iūniperus, iūniperī, in spite of the language of the Latium regularly exposing the nominative singular ending -erus only from old -esos while -er for old -ros. Often connected to Old Norse einir (“juniper”), supposedly from a Proto-Germanic *(j)ainijaz of the same meaning, through a common Indo-European origin or wanderwort. Per Trubachyov, also related to iūnīx, typologically the same as *jalovьcь (whence Czech jalovec, Russian я́ловец (jálovec)) related to *jalovica (whence Czech jalovice, Russian я́ловица (jálovica)) (both from Proto-Slavic *jalovъ (whence Czech jalový, Russian я́ловый (jálovyj))).

In English words that came into English from iūniperus

• juniperiūniperus
• ginziniperus
• jeneverziniperus