Where does “knyttneve” come from?
knyttneve (Norwegian Bokmål) comes from Norwegian Bokmål knytte, from Old Norse knýta, from Proto-Germanic knuttijaną, from Proto-Germanic -janą, from Proto-Indo-European -yéti, from Proto-Indo-European yé-, from Chichewa iye — he, she.
knyttneve (Norwegian Bokmål): a clenched fist
Ancestry of “knyttneve”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | Norwegian Bokmål | knytte | to knot, tie; to link; knytte sammen - to connect |
| 2 | Old Norse | knýta | — |
| 3 | Proto-Germanic | knuttijaną | to bind into a knot; to tie with a knot |
| 4 | Proto-Germanic | -janą | Derives denominatives from nouns and factitives... |
| 5 | Proto-Indo-European | -yéti | Creates intransitive, often deponent,... |
| 6 | Proto-Indo-European | yé- | — |
| 7 | Chichewa | iye | he, she |