English
bluet
Bluet comes from Middle English blew ‘blue’, and goes back to Proto-Indo-European *bʰleh₁-.
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*bʰleh₁-1‘blue, gray, yellow’reconstructed
- Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*blēwaz2‘blue’reconstructed
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500blew3as blewe‘blue’
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500blawede3
- Englishearliest quotation 1899bluet3
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
- 1 Wiktionary, Proto-Germanic *blēwaz, which cites Kroonen
- 2 Wiktionary, Middle English blew
- 3 Wiktionary, English bluet
- Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1899, Walter Phelps Dodge, [Piers] Gaveston’s Early Days with Edward of Carnarvon: “For the Feast of the Assumption, cloth of bluet…”.
Lineage
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*bʰleh₁-Wiktionary, Proto-Germanic *blēwaz, which cites Kroonen‘blue, gray, yellow’reconstructed
- Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*blēwazWiktionary, Middle English blew‘blue’reconstructed
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500blewWiktionary, English bluetas blewe‘blue’
- Middle Englishc. 1150–1500blawedeWiktionary, English bluet
- Englishearliest quotation 1899bluetWiktionary, English bluet. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1899, Walter Phelps Dodge, [Piers] Gaveston’s Early Days with Edward of Carnarvon: “For the Feast of the Assumption, cloth of bluet…”
Equivalent to blue + -et
Proto-Indo-European *bʰlēw- ‘yellow, blond, grey’
…
Old French bloe ‘blue’
Middle French bleu
Anglo-Norman blew
Middle English blew
English blue
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *bʰleh₁- ‘blue, gray, yellow’
inflation, flavor, blast, blowing, blown, bliss, bladder, flux, inflate, fluent, feeble, confluence, flatulence, fluency, conflate, blithely, fluvial, blare, blather, bleat, 42 more
through Proto-Germanic *blēwaz ‘blue’
through Middle English blew ‘blue’
Today it means
noun Any of several different plants, from several genera, having bluish flowers.
Sources
Sources: Wiktionary, “bluet”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entries for Proto-Germanic *blēwaz, Middle English blew. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.
Etymograph / Proto-Indo-European *bʰleh₁- / bluet