brandish v.

Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to heat, warm."

It forms all or part of: brand; brandish; brandy; brimstone; brindled; forceps; Fornax; fornicate; fornication; fornix; furnace; hypothermia; thermal; thermo-; Thermopylae; Thermos.

It is the hypothetical source of/evidence for its existence is provided by: Sanskrit gharmah "heat;" Old Persian Garmapada-, name of the fourth month, corresponding to June/July, from garma- "heat;" Hittite war- "to burn;" Armenian jerm "warm;" Greek thermos "warm;" Latin formus "warm," fornax "oven;" Old Irish fogeir "heated;" Old English bærnan "to kindle."

Old English brand, brond "fire, flame, destruction by fire; firebrand, piece of burning wood, torch," and (poetic) "sword," from Proto-Germanic *brandaz "a burning" (source also of Old Norse brandr, Old High German brant, Old Frisian brond "firebrand; blade of a sword," German brand "fire"), from PIE root *gwher- "to heat, warm."

The meaning "iron instrument for branding" is from 1828. The meaning "mark made by a hot iron" (1550s), especially on a cask, etc., to identify the maker or quality of its contents, had broadened by 1827 to include marks made in other ways, then to "a particular make of goods" (1854). Brand-name is from 1889; brand-loyalty from 1961. Old French brand, brant, Italian brando "sword" are from Germanic (compare brandish).