germanic
UK /d͡ʒɜːˈmæn.ɪk/ · US /d͡ʒɝˈmæn.ɪk/ adjective, proper noun, noun
Forms Germanics
- adjective Of or containing germanium.
- adjective Containing germanium with a valence of 4.
- proper noun (linguistics) The early, undocumented ancestral language from which other Germanic languages developed, such as Afrikaans, Danish, Dutch, Frisian, English, German, Faroese, Icelandic, Yiddish, Norwegian and Swedish.
- proper noun (linguistics) The group of Indo-European languages that developed from (Ur-)Germanic.
- adjective Relating to the Germanic peoples (such as Germans, Scandinavians or Anglo-Saxons). “a Germanic tribe”
- adjective (linguistics) Relating to the language or group of languages known as Germanic. “a Germanic language”
- adjective (sometimes proscribed) Having German characteristics. “He arrived with Germanic punctuality.”
- noun (historical, nonstandard) Synonym of German (“member of a Germanic tribe”)
Synonyms
Ur-Germanic Proto-Germanic Common Germanic Teutonic German Germanic language
Etymology
Learned borrowing from Latin germānicus, equivalent to German + -ic.
Webster’s 1913
- adjective Pertaining to, or containing, germanium.
- adjective Of or pertaining to Germany; as, the Germanic confederacy.
- adjective Teutonic. [A loose sense]
Etymology [L. Germanicus: cf. F. germanique. See German, n.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “germanic”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details