Where does “tribes” come from?
Tribes comes from Middle English tribe, from Old French tribu, from Latin tribus, possibly related to the Proto-Indo-European root tréyes meaning three.
tribes (English): plural of tribe
Ancestry of “tribes”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | English | tribe | A socially, ethnically, or politically cohesive... |
| 2 | Middle English | tribe | One of the twelve tribes of Israel; Any tribe or... |
| 3 | Old French | tribu | tribe |
| 4 | Latin | tribus | One of the three original tribes of Rome: Ramnes,... |
| 5 | Latin | trēs | — |
| 6 | Proto-Italic | trēs | three |
| 7 | Proto-Indo-European | *tréyes | — |