Meanings
-
1
adj
relating to or characteristic of wooded regions
A shady sylvan glade.
Thesaurus
Etymology
Borrowed from Medieval Latin sylvanus, possibly via Middle French sylvain, from Latin silvanus, cognate with Latin Silvānus (“Roman god of the woods”), from silva (“forest”), from Proto-Indo-European *sel-, *swel- (“beam, board, frame, threshold”). The ⟨y⟩ in sylvanus and its descendants is due to influence from Ancient Greek ῡ̔́λη (hū́lē, “wood, matter”), transliterated in the Latin style as hyle. Analysable as sylva (“silva”) + -an.
*swel-
Proto-Indo-European
sylvanus
la-med
sylvain
Middle French
silvanus
Latin
Silvānus
Latin
*sel-
Proto-Indo-European
ῡ̔́λη
Ancient Greek
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