Reconstruction:Proto-Finnic/küllä

This Proto-Finnic 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-Finnic

Etymology

Unknown. Related to Northern Sami galle, either by inheritance or by early borrowing from Finnic into Samic.

A highly speculative etymology (with semantic and phonological issues) has been put forward by Saarikivi (2020) that the word represents a borrowing from Proto-Germanic *geldaną (compare German gültig).

Noun

*küllä

1. abundance

Adverb

*küllä

1. An intensifier corresponding to English do, as in "I did do that".

Descendants

• Estonian: küll
• Finnish: kyllä
• Ingrian: kyl
• Karelian:
  • North Karelian: kyllä
  • South Karelian: kyllä
• Livonian: ki’l
• ⇒ Veps: külläine
• Votic: küll

Further reading

• “küll”, in [ETY] Eesti etümoloogiasõnaraamat [Estonian Etymological Dictionary] (in Estonian) (online version), Tallinn: Eesti Keele Sihtasutus (Estonian Language Foundation), 2012
• Itkonen, Erkki, Kulonen, Ulla-Maija, editors (1992–2000), “kyllä”, in Suomen sanojen alkuperä [The origin of Finnish words]‎^[1] (in Finnish) (online version; note: also includes other etymological sources), Helsinki: Institute for the Languages of Finland/Finnish Literature Society, →ISBN