Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/tewtéh₂

Reconstruction
Clear cognates are found only in Italo-Celtic, Balto-Slavic and Germanic, which may point to an old European word, geographically confined to the west and center of the IE world.

🇨🇬 and its 🇨🇬 cognates are sometimes considered descendants, but the semantic divergence is difficult to reconcile.

The supposed Hittite cognate with the semantic shift "people" > "army" > "camp" has been criticized to be unlikely (the normal development would be "camp" > "army"). Kloekhorst furthermore argues that the Hittite word can formally only reflect an i-stem, and finally endorses an alternative etymology proposed by Melchert, from PIE.

Often a derivation from either of the roots (referring to the strength of community) and   is considered, but the presence of a laryngeal renders that suspect.

Noun

 * 1) heap, pile; crowd ?
 * 2)  people, tribe

Coordinate terms

 * *déh₂mos
 * Ancient Greek:
 * *pleh₁dʰwéh₁s
 * *pleh₁dʰwéh₁s

Derived terms

 * *swe-tewtéh₂-