An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/Bahre

by Friedrich Kluge

Bahre, feminine, ‘barrow, bier,’ from the equivalent Middle High German bâre, Old High German bâra, feminine; Gothic *bêra or *bêrô, feminine; Anglo-Saxon bœ̂r, bœ̂re, English bier; English barrow (Middle English barewe), belongs to a different gradation since it presupposes Gothic *barwa; compare Old Icelandic barar, plural ‘bier,’ Gothic *barôs. The pre-Teutonic phonetic form is bhérâ-. From the Old High German word is derived the equivalent Italian bara (barella), French bière. The root is the primitive Aryan bher, ‘to carry,’ which is widely diffused, and appears in Modern High German Bürde, gebären, Geburt, as well as in Zuber; it occurs in Indian as bhar, in Greek as φερ, in Latin as fer. From this root the Old Teutonic languages, in agreement with all the other Aryan tongues, formed a strong verb, Gothic baìran, Old High German bëran, Middle High German bërn (the latter means only ‘to bear fruit, produce, give birth to’), Anglo-Saxon bëran, English to bear. Compare especially gebären.