*wer-

This is one of several roots that had at their core the idea of:

turning, winding, bending

The most obvious English offspring are words like worm, warp, weird, wrestle, wrist and more (see below).

But also -ward, worry, worth and wrong belong to the family, each with their own… ahem… twist on the original sense.

But the root is also the origin of the Latin verb *vertere. This verb meant to bend and it’s the origin of dozens of words like versus, vertebra, invert, subvert, versatile and me … I mean… introvert.

The three most important relatives in German are werden (“turning toward, winding up” -> to become), der Wert (“what you give versus what you get” -> worth) and werfen (“winding motion with your hand”- to throw).

Here’s an (incomplete) list of English relatives and how they tie in with the original sense:

• -ward (“winding in a direction”)
• warp 
• weird (“twisted”)
• worm, vermin
• wrestle, wrist (“winding, bending”)
• wrinkle, wriggle, wrangle,… (all about “twisting” in some way)
• wrong (originally “twisting your mouth”)
• worry (originally “to strangle the throat”)
• worth (originally what you give “versus” something else)

• versus (“turn toward”)
• version (“what you turn out, rendition”)
• vertebra (“what bends”)
• versatile (“turns in many directions”)

• invert (“turn backward”)
• convert (“to turn to”)
• extrovert (“turned outward”)
• introvert (me)
• pervert (“turned beyond”)
• subvert (Star Wars expectations)
• anniversary (“turn of the year”)
• universe (all wrapped in one)