sar

Forms

sār (adjective; comparative sārra); sār n (noun, strong a-stem).^[1][2]

Etymology

The adjective is inherited from Proto-West Germanic *sair, from Proto-Germanic *sairaz (“sore, painful”); the neuter noun goes back to the Proto-Germanic noun *sairą (“pain, wound”).^[1][3] The adjective has cognates in Old Norse sárr (“sore, wounded”), Old Saxon sēr (“grievous”) and Old High German sēr (“sad”), with the adverb Old Frisian sēre (“very”).^[4][5] The noun is Gothic 𐍃𐌰𐌹𐍂 (sair, “pain”), Old Norse sár (“wound”) and the Old Saxon and Old High German noun of the same form, meaning “pain”.^[6][3]

Holthausen and Orel compare Latin saevus (“fierce”), Latvian sievs (“sharp, biting”) and Old Irish sáeth (“illness, pain”), Orel only as a possibility.^[7][4] Köbler gives the root Proto-Indo-European *sāi- (“pain, sickness”).^[3] Wiktionary reconstructs Proto-Indo-European *seh₂i-ro-, from Proto-Indo-European *seh₂y- (“to be fierce, afflict”).^[1]

Proto-Germanic /ai/ appears as ⟨ā⟩ in Old English, against the ⟨ē⟩ of Old Frisian, Old Saxon and Old High German.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The noun is first recorded in the Vespasian Psalter gloss, added in the middle of the ninth century: Psalm 126 has ða ðe eotað hlaf sares “you who eat the bread of sorrow” over the Latin “panem doloris”.^[8][9] The Pastoral Care of 890×897 has the noun, bið eft onæled mid ðy fyre ðæs sares “is kindled again with the fire of the grievance”, and the comparative of the adjective: sio diegle wund bið sarre ðonne sio opene “the hidden wound is sorer than the open one”.^[10][9][11]

Semantic evolution

Bosworth and Toller divide both the noun and the adjective into bodily and mental pain: the noun is pain, soreness and a wound or sore, and then sorrow and grief; the adjective is painful of wounds and of hardship, and then grievous and distressing.^[2][11] In the Leechbook and the other medical texts the noun names sores and aches, and compounds such as hēafodsār “headache” are made with it.^[12][13] In the laws it is a wound, and once the pains of hell.^[14] In glosses the noun renders Latin dolor and poena.^[3] It is frequent in poetry, in Beowulf, Andreas, the Exeter Book and Junius 11.^[15][9]

The adjective and the noun both lived on as Middle English sore, now English sore.^[1][16] Etymonline thinks its meaning there was influenced by Old Norse sárr.^[16]

Timeline

• s. ix med. – the noun, hlaf sares “bread of sorrow”, in the Vespasian Psalter gloss.^[8][9]
• 890×897 – the adjective, sio diegle wund bið sarre “the hidden wound is sorer”, in the Pastoral Care (Hatton 20).^[10][11]
• s. x med. – in Bald's Leechbook.^[17][9]
• s. x/xi – sār “pain, wound” in the Beowulf manuscript.^[18][15]

Meanings

Adjective

1. sore, painful, of a wound or of hardship.^[11][19]
2. causing sorrow, grievous, bitter.^[11][15]

Noun

1. bodily pain, suffering; sickness.^[2][12]
2. a wound, a sore.^[12][15]
3. sorrow, grief, affliction.^[2][19]

Word family

• sāre
• sārnes
• sārian
• unsār
• līcsār
• hēafodsār
• mūþsār
• wærcsār

Descendants

• Middle English sore (→ English sore; Scots sair; Scots sare)^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 816
3. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Altenglisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. sār
4. ^ a b Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. 313
5. ^ Heidermanns, Frank (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der germanischen Primäradjektive, Berlin / New York: De Gruyter, p. 463
6. ^ a b Ringe, Don; Taylor, Ann (2014), The Development of Old English, A Linguistic History of English II, Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 171
7. ^ Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 270
8. ^ a b Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 329
9. ^ a b c d e Healey, Antonette diPaolo; Price Wilkin, John; Xiang, Xin, eds. (2009), Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus, Toronto: Dictionary of Old English Project
10. ^ a b Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 499
11. ^ a b c d e Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 817
12. ^ a b c Clark Hall, J. R. (1960), A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, 4th ed., with a supplement by H. D. Meritt, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 290
13. ^ Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. Suppl. 694
14. ^ Liebermann, F. (1906), Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, vol. II.1: Wörterbuch, Halle: Niemeyer, p. 189
15. ^ a b c d Fulk, R. D.; Bjork, Robert E.; Niles, John D., eds. (2008), Klaeber's Beowulf and The Fight at Finnsburg, 4th ed., Toronto: University of Toronto Press (glossary), p. s.v. sār
16. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
17. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 412
18. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 344
19. ^ a b Sweet, Henry (1896), The Student's Dictionary of Anglo-Saxon, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 167