meǵ-

The root *meǵ- generates vocabulary for greatness, size, and power across the IE family, with an unusual degree of productivity in both literal and extended senses. Latin magnus ("great, large") is enormously productive: magnitude, magnify, magnificent, magnate, major (from *maǵ-yōs, the comparative), majority, mayor (through Old French, from Latin māior), maxim and maximum (from the superlative maximus), and the name Magnus. The compound Carolus Magnus ("Charles the Great") gives Charlemagne, and the Roman family name Maximus derives from the superlative. Greek mégas (μέγας, genitive megálou) yields mega- (the prefix denoting largeness or one million), megalomania, and omega (ō méga, "great O," as opposed to omicron, ō mikrón, "small O"). The Megarian school and the city of Megalopolis ("great city") take their names from this root. Sanskrit máhi ("great") and the related mahā́nt- ("great, powerful") are culturally significant: Mahārāja ("great king"), Mahātma ("great soul"), Mahābhārata ("great [tale of the] Bhārata"), and Mahāyāna ("great vehicle" of Buddhism) all employ derivatives of this root. The Indian title Maharajah and the philosophical title Mahatma are perhaps the most widely recognised Sanskrit compounds in English. The Germanic reflex is more limited: Old English micel ("great," surviving in the name Mitchell and the archaic much/mickle), and Gothic mikils. The replacement of the inherited adjective by great (from *gʰrewt-, "to grow") and big (of unknown origin) in English represents a significant lexical substitution. Old Irish maige ("great") and Old Church Slavonic mogǫ ("I am able," from the sense "to be mighty") extend the attestation. The semantic path from "great" to "powerful" to "able" in Slavic parallels the Latin development magnus > magister > master.