Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/lukъ

This Proto-Slavic entry contains reconstructed terms and roots. As such, the term(s) in this entry are not directly attested, but are hypothesized to have existed based on comparative evidence.

Proto-Slavic

*lukъ – Allium cepa

Etymology

Possibly from Proto-Indo-European *lewg- (“to bend”). Compare Low German look, Look, German Lauch, Swedish lök.

Noun

*lukъ m

(usually uncountable) onion, leek (Allium cepa, Allium ampeloprasum and its bulb and its leaves)

Inflection

Declension of *lukъ (hard o-stem, accent paradigm a)

	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	*lukъ	*lùka	*lùci
Accusative	*lukъ	*lùka	*lùky
Genitive	*lùka	*lùku	*lùkъ
Locative	*lùcě	*lùku	*lùcě̄xъ
Dative	*lùku	*lùkoma	*lùkomъ
Instrumental	lùkъmь, lùkomь^*	*lùkoma	*lùkȳ
Vocative	*lùče	*lùka	*lùci

^* -ъmь in North Slavic, -omь in South Slavic.

Descendants

East Slavic:
- Old East Slavic: лукъ (lukŭ, “onion”)
  - Old Ruthenian: лукъ (luk, “onion”)
    - Belarusian: лук (luk, “onion”) (dialectal)
    - Ukrainian: лук (luk, “onion”) (dialectal)
  - Russian: лук (luk, “onion; garlic”) (see there for further descendants)
South Slavic:
- Old Church Slavonic:
  Old Cyrillic: лоукъ (lukŭ, “garlic, onion”)
  Glagolitic: ⰾⱆⰽⱏ (lukŭ, “garlic, onion”)
  - Russian Church Slavonic: лукъ (lukŭ)
- Bulgarian: лук (luk, “onion; garlic”)
- Macedonian: лук (luk, “garlic”)
- Serbo-Croatian:
  Cyrillic: лу̏к (“onion; garlic”)
  Latin: lȕk (“onion; garlic”)
- Old Slovene: luk (“onion”)
  - Slovene: lùk (“leek, onion”); lòk (“garlic”) (dialectal)
West Slavic:
- Old Czech: luk (“garlic”)
- Polabian: lauk (“garlic”)
- Old Polish: łuk (“leek”)
  - Polish: łuk (“garlic; hyacinth”) (regional)
- Slovak: luk (regional)
- Slovincian: łëk (“green onion”)

Baltic:
- → Latvian: loki
- → Old Lithuanian: lūkai

References

Trubachyov, Oleg, editor (1990), “*lukъ”, in Этимологический словарь славянских языков [Etymological Dictionary of Slavic Languages] (in Russian), issue 16 (*lokadlo – *lъživьcь), Moscow: Nauka, →ISBN, page 172
Olander, Thomas (2001), “lukъ”, in Common Slavic accentological word list, Copenhagen: Editiones Olander: “a (SA 147; PR 131; RPT 101)”
Pronk-Tiethoff, Saskia E. (2013) The Germanic loanwords in Proto-Slavic‎ (in English), Amsterdam - New York: Rodopi, →ISBN, pages 87–88