'Concern' traces to Latin 'cernere' (to sift) — kin to 'crisis,' 'crime,' 'secret,' and 'certain.'
A matter of interest or importance; worry or anxiety; to relate to or be relevant to.
From Medieval Latin 'concernere' (to relate to, to regard, to be relevant to), from Latin 'concernere' (to sift together, to mix, to mingle, to decide), from 'con-' (together, with) + 'cernere' (to sift, to separate, to distinguish, to perceive, to decide). The PIE root is *krey- (to sieve, to separate, to distinguish). This root is one of Latin's most intellectually productive: 'cernere' also gave 'discern' (to separate clearly), 'certain' (firmly
The words 'concern,' 'secret,' 'crisis,' 'crime,' 'critic,' and 'certain' all descend from the same PIE root *krey- (to sieve, separate). The conceptual thread is judgment through separation: to sieve is to distinguish good from bad, true from false. A 'crisis' is a moment of separation (Greek