'Soul' may connect to PIE *saiwaz (sea) — an ancient belief that souls came from and returned to water.
The immaterial essence or animating principle of a living being; the spiritual part of a person regarded as immortal.
From Old English 'sāwol' (soul, life, spirit), from Proto-Germanic *saiwalō, of uncertain ultimate origin. One hypothesis connects it to Proto-Germanic *saiwaz (sea, lake), suggesting the ancient Germanic belief that souls originated from and returned to bodies of water — a cosmology in which lakes and seas were the dwelling places of the unborn and the dead. Another theory links it to a root meaning 'binding' or 'tethering,' as the soul was conceived as what bound the living body to its animating force
One hypothesis links 'soul' to Proto-Germanic *saiwaz (sea), suggesting that ancient Germanic peoples believed souls came from and returned to water — lakes and seas were the dwelling places of the unborn and the dead. If correct, every time we say 'soul' we echo a pre-Christian water cosmology.