Etymograph

English

yelm

Yelm comes from Middle English yelm ‘yelm, yealm’, from Old English ġielm ‘bunch or handful’, and perhaps ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃- ‘green, yellow’.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*ǵʰelh₃-1‘green, yellow’uncertain
  2. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*galmi1‘bundle or handful of plants’reconstructed
  3. Old Englishc. 450–1150ġielm1‘bunch or handful’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500yelm1‘yelm, yealm’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1802yelm1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English yelm
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1802, O. pseudonym, On the Cultivation of Furze: “Horses thrive particularly well upon it [furze], and are…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*ǵʰelh₃-Wiktionary, English yelm‘green, yellow’uncertain
  2. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*galmiWiktionary, English yelm‘bundle or handful of plants’reconstructed
  3. Old Englishc. 450–1150ġielmWiktionary, English yelm‘bunch or handful’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500yelmWiktionary, English yelm‘yelm, yealm’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1802yelmWiktionary, English yelm. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1802, O. pseudonym, On the Cultivation of Furze: “Horses thrive particularly well upon it [furze], and are…”

The story

The noun is derived from Middle English yelm, from Old English ġielm (‘bunch or handful (of plant stems)’), from Proto-West Germanic *galmi (‘bundle or handful of plants’), possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃- (‘green, yellow’) or *gʰel- (‘to cut’).

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰelh₃- ‘green, yellow’

gold, fell, yellow, chlorine, gall, cholera, gullible, yolk, felon, glib, choline, gild, zloty, chlorella, 26 more

Today it means

noun A bundle of straw laid out straight, chiefly to be used for thatching; a helm.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “yelm”. 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 *ǵʰelh₃- / yelm

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