An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/beben

by Friedrich Kluge

beben, verb, ‘to tremble, shake,’ from Middle High German biben, Old High German bibên, ‘to shiver, tremble’; Greek φέβομας, on account of the non-permutation of β to p and because of the ε of the root syllable, cannot be originally cognate with beben. The Old Teutonic word has i; compare Old Saxon biƀôn, Old Icelandic bifa, Anglo-Saxon beofian (from biƀôn), Old High German bibêt, ‘he trembles,’ corresponds exactly to Sanscrit bíbhêti, ‘he is afraid,’ in which bi- (for bhi) is the reduplicated syllable, and bhê for bhai is the augmented root syllable. The Old Indian verb bhî, ‘to be afraid,’ forms its present by reduplication — bíbhêmi, bíbhéši, bíbhêti; to these Gothic *bibaim, *bibais, *bibaiþ, would correspond; this present was then, on account of its apparent derivative ai, classed among the weak verbs in ai (Gothic habaiþ, Old High German habêt). The root bhî (Sanscrit bhî, ‘fear,’ bhîmá, ‘fearful’) is found in Old Slovenian boją sę, ‘I am afraid,’ běsŭ, ‘demon,’ Lithuanian byóti-s, ‘to be afraid,’ báime, ‘fear,’ bajùs, ‘terrible,’ baisà, ‘fright’ (and perhaps Modern High German beilen). Bi- is one of the few examples of reduplication in the present tense preserved in the Teutonic group (compare zittern), just as the perfect Modern High German thät, from Old High German tëta, is the sole instance of reduplication preserved in the perfect tense.