Feminine

nurus

Meaning

(declension-4, feminine) daughter-in-law
(declension-4, feminine) granddaughter-in-law
(declension-4, feminine) young married woman, young lady

daughter in law

νύφη

’nifi

(كنّة

κόρη

Pronounced as (IPA)

[ˈnʊ.rʊs]

Inherited from Proto-Indo-European *snusós, remade into an u-stem likely by influence of socrus, -ūs (“mother in law”). The first -u- is unexpected, as original *-u- before -r- arising from *-s- would have been expected to lower to *-o- (cf. serō < *sish₁-). The expected outcome is nevertheless reflected in most Romance descendants (eg. Spanish nuera, Italian nuora, etc.), although they could be secondary, and shifted from the attested -u- by influence of other female kinship terms such as socrus or soror (“sister”). The variant ending in -a, also found in Romance descendants but attested already in the Appendix Probi, while also conceivably secondary, reflects a Proto-Indo-European *snus-éh₂ also reflected in Proto-Germanic *snuzō, Proto-Slavic *snъxà and Sanskrit स्नुषा (snuṣā́).