tien (Old English)
Where does "tien" come from?
The English word 'tien' traces its roots back to the ancient Proto-Indo-European number *déḱm̥. It evolved through Proto-Germanic and Proto-West Germanic as *tehun before eventually entering Old English. This journey illustrates the deep, ancestral roots of our modern word for the number ten.
Full etymology tree
- tien (Old English), 'ten'
- inherited *tehun (Proto-West Germanic), 'ten'
- inherited *tehun (Proto-Germanic), 'ten'
- inherited *déḱm̥ (Proto-Indo-European), 'ten'
- inherited *tehunt (Proto-Germanic)
- inherited *déḱm̥t (Proto-Indo-European)
- inherited *tehun (Proto-Germanic), 'ten'
- inherited *tehun (Proto-West Germanic), 'ten'
Ancestors
- *tehun (Proto-West Germanic)
- *tehun (Proto-Germanic)
- *déḱm̥ (Proto-Indo-European)
Descendants and derived words
- ten (Middle English)
- ten (Middle English)
- ten (Middle English)
Updated July 2026
Etymology data from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · About Miraris