The dictionary ('The Slovenian Etymological Dictionary') answers the questions why the Slovenian word for “bread” is spelt kruh, the word for “water” voda, why the word meaning “wine” is vino, and not otherwise; from which languages Slovenian words aperitiv, garsonjera, gangster, etc. have been borrowed, as well as what they originally meant. It is designed as a reference book from which one learns the origin of contemporary standard Slovenian words even without having profound linguistic knowledge. Etymological explanations are therefore written in a way that they can be understood by non-experts. They are accompanied by minimal argumentation and documentation, the original meanings of the words are expressed explicitly, but in accordance with the achievements of modern Slovenian, Slavic, and Indo-European etymology.
The third edition of the dictionary (the first edition was published in1997, and the second in 2003) contains 9,494 entries, in which 30,221 most frequent Slovenian words are etymologically explained. The content of the dictionary is available online on the portal www.fran.si.