Link Centre Dictionary

Aryan

UK/ˈɛəɹi.ən/ US/ˈɛəjən/ fairly common informal us

adjective

1.

of or relating to the former Indo-European people

  • “Indo-European migrations”

noun

2.

a member of the prehistoric people who spoke Proto-Indo European

Origin

Originally from Sanskrit आर्य (ā́rya, “noble; noble one”) and + -n. The Sanskrit word is an autonym originally from Proto-Indo-Iranian *áryas (see there for more). Borrowed into English in the 19th century, at first as a term for the Indo-Iranian languages, and later partly extended to the Indo-European languages and peoples following a theory by Friedrich Schlegel that connected the Indo-Iranian words arya/ā́rya with German Ehre (“honor”) and some older Germanic names, thus assuming that it was the original Indo-European autonym meaning "the honorable people". The original meaning of the Indo-Iranian autonym and its possible Indo-European origin/cognates are disputed (see the Wikipedia article for further details). The same Proto-Indo-Iranian root is the ultimate source of the country name Iran. Also the doublet of Arya.

Related words

Broader terms

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.