An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/gar

by Friedrich Kluge

gar, adjective (and adverb), ‘finished, ready, done’ (of cooked food), from Middle High German gar (inflected garwer), adjective, gare, adverb, Old High German garo (inflected garawêr), adjective, garo, garawo, adverb, ‘made ready,’ armed, prepared, complete, entire’; corresponding to Old Saxon garo, Anglo-Saxon gearo (adverb, gearwe also), English yare, Olc. gǫrr (adverb gǫrwa), ‘ready, prepared, made’; Gothic *garwa- is wanting. The adjective was really used as a participle, the suffix wo in Indian, combines with the root pac, ‘to cook,’ forming the participle pakvâ-s, ‘cooked, done’ (of food). Besides Anglo-Saxon gearo, ‘ready,’ a remarkable form, earo, is found with the same meaning, and in Old Saxon aru as well as gara; these forms point to Gothic *garwa and *arwa, ‘prepared, made ready.’ Hence some have identified the two classes regarding the g of *garwa- as the remnant of the verbal particle Gothic ga (High German ge).