Venus

Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to desire, strive for."

It forms all or part of: vanadium; Vanir; venerate; veneration; venerable; venereal; venery (n.1) "pursuit of sexual pleasure;" venery (n.2) "hunting, the sports of the chase;" venial; venison; venom; Venus; wean; ween; Wend "Slavic people of eastern Germany;" win; winsome; wish; wont; wynn.

It is the hypothetical source of/evidence for its existence is provided by: Sanskrit veti "follows after," vanas- "desire," vanati "desires, loves, wins;" Avestan vanaiti "he wishes, is victorious;" Latin venerari "to worship," venus "love, sexual desire; loveliness, beauty;" Old English wynn "joy," wunian "to dwell," wenian "to accustom, train, wean," wyscan "to wish."

Greek goddess of love and beauty, personification of female grace, 1650s; the ancients derived her name from Greek aphros "foam," from the story of her birth, but the word is perhaps rather from Phoenician Ashtaroth (Assyrian Ishtar). Beekes writes, "As the goddess seems to be of oriental origin ..., the name probably comes from the East too. .... It may have entered Greek via another language." He concludes, "[I]t seems possible that the name came from the one languages [sic] which on historical grounds we should expect to be relevant: Cypriot Phoenician."

Associated by the Romans with their Venus, who originally was a less-important goddess. It was pronounced in 17c. English to rhyme with night, right, etc.