Etymograph

English

impure

Impure comes from Latin impūrus ‘impure, defiled, filthy, infamous, vile’, from pūrus ‘pure’, and ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *pewH- ‘to cleanse, purify’.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*pewH-1‘to cleanse, purify’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*pūros1reconstructed
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpūrus2‘pure’
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEimpūrus3‘impure, defiled, filthy, infamous, vile’
  5. Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600impur3
  6. Englishearliest quotation 2012impure3

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, Latin purus
  2. 2 Wiktionary, Latin impurus
  3. 3 Wiktionary, English impure
  4. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 2012, Frederick Ramsay: ““No one would marry her if she was impure,…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*pewH-Wiktionary, Latin purus‘to cleanse, purify’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*pūrosWiktionary, Latin purusreconstructed
  3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEpūrusWiktionary, Latin impurus‘pure’
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEimpūrusWiktionary, English impure‘impure, defiled, filthy, infamous, vile’
  5. Middle Frenchc. 1400–1600impurWiktionary, English impure
  6. Englishearliest quotation 2012impureWiktionary, English impure. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 2012, Frederick Ramsay: ““No one would marry her if she was impure,…”

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *pewH- ‘to cleanse, purify’

deputy, reputation, pity, pious, piety, putative, expiation, puro, 16 more

through Latin pūrus ‘pure’

pour, purity, purification, purify, purist, puree, 8 more

Today it means

adj Containing undesired intermixtures

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “impure”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entries for Latin purus, Latin impurus. 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 *pewH- / impure

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