six

Forms

six^[1] Early West Saxon siex; also syx and seox.^[2][3][1] sex in the Lindisfarne and Rushworth gospel glosses.^[4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-West Germanic *sehs, from Proto-Germanic *sehs (“six”).^[1][5] The numeral is Gothic 𐍃𐌰𐌹𐌷𐍃 (saihs), Old Norse sex, Old Frisian sex, Old Saxon sehs and Old High German sehs in the other old Germanic languages.^[5][6][7]

It continues the numeral Proto-Indo-European *swéḱs (“six”), which lost its *w* in Germanic as in Latin sex.^[1] Orel lists Ancient Greek ἕξ (héx), Old Irish sé and Lithuanian šešì among its other reflexes.^[6] Kroonen holds that the oldest form had no initial *s*, on the evidence of the Old Prussian ordinal.^[5]

Hogg explains early West Saxon ⟨siex⟩ by i-umlaut of the broken diphthong in inflected forms, and supposes competing early West Saxon forms with and without palatal umlaut, given late West Saxon ⟨six⟩.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

An early dated record is in the Old English Orosius, in a manuscript of the first half of the tenth century: he sæde þæt he syxa sum ofsloge syxtig on twam dagum, “he said that he, one of six, killed sixty in two days”.^[8][9][4] The Old English Bede, in a manuscript of the early tenth or the first half of the eleventh century, counts hundteontig & fiftig & six gear, “a hundred and fifty-six years”, from the coming of Christ.^[10][9]

Semantic evolution

Before a noun it is usually not inflected, as in on six dagum “in six days”; standing alone it is declined, with the genitive syxa in syxa sum “one of six”.^[4][11] In the laws syx swa micel means “six times as much”.^[12][4]

It lived on as Middle English six, now English six.^[13][14]

Timeline

• s. x¹ or x²/⁴ – syxa sum “one of six” in the Old English Orosius.^[8][9]
• s. x in. or xi¹ – hundteontig & fiftig & six gear in the Old English Bede.^[10][9]
• s. x² – in Juliana and Guthlac in the Exeter Book.^[15][9]
• s. x ex. – Ælfric's Catholic Homilies I.^[16][9]

Meanings

Numeral

1. six, before a noun (usually uninflected).^[4][3]
2. as a noun, declined: six people or things;^[4] syxa sum “one of six”.^[4]
3. syx swa micel “six times as much”.^[12]

Word family

• sixta
• sixtiġ
• sixfeald

Descendants

• Middle English six (→ English six; Scots sax; Scots sex)^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Hogg, Richard M. (1992), A Grammar of Old English, vol. 1: Phonology, Oxford: Blackwell, p. § 5.113
3. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Altenglisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. siex
4. ^ a b c d e f g Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 880
5. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. 431
6. ^ a b Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. 322
7. ^ Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 293
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. 249
9. ^ a b c d e f 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. 531
11. ^ Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. Suppl. 704
12. ^ a b Liebermann, F. (1906), Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, vol. II.1: Wörterbuch, Halle: Niemeyer, p. 197
13. ^ Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
14. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
15. ^ 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. 223
16. ^ 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. 407