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harrow

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Etymology and origin of the English word harrow

Pronunciation

  • UK: /ˈhæɹəʊ/[1]
  • US: /ˈhæɹoʊ/, /ˈhɛɹoʊ/[1]

harrow1 farm implement

Confidence
Probable
Formation
Inherited
First attested
c. 1300 South English Legendary
Inherited from
Middle English harwen via Middle English, Old English

Etymology

The farm implement is inherited from Middle English harwe, also haru and harow,[2][3][4] answering to an unrecorded inherited from Old English *hearwa.[2][3][5][4] It is apparently related to Middle Low German harke and Dutch hark (“rake”), and to Old Norse herfi, harfr, Swedish harv and Danish harv (“harrow”), but the relations between the forms are obscure and the further origin is uncertain.[5][3][6] The Middle English Dictionary thinks a borrowing from Old Norse or Middle Low German unlikely on phonological grounds, and compares Old English hyrwan (“to abuse, ill-treat”);[2] the Shorter Oxford, the Oxford Dictionary of English and Collins, however, take the word from Old Norse,[7][8][9] and Hoad from a prehistoric Old Norse form of herfi.[10] Klein and Etymonline connect it with harvest,[6][4] and Merriam-Webster compares Ancient Greek κείρω (keírō, “to cut”), the relative of shear.[11] The verb is inherited from Middle English harwen, formed from the noun.[2][3][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

A frame set with teeth, dragged over ploughed land: about 1300, in the South English Legendary's story of the childhood of Christ, where Joseph could make whatever tool was needed for the harrow or the plough.[2][3][4] The OED dates the same text to before 1350.[5] The verb, to draw a harrow over land, is recorded before 1325 in the Cursor Mundi,[3] or from 1377 in Piers Plowman in the OED's dating.[5]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English the harrow was already used figuratively, of the Old or New Testament and of the power of love,[2] and in proverbs.[2][5] Weekley compares the phrase toad under the harrow and quotes a Middle English text in which the frog says to the harrow "cursid be so many lordis".[12] From the 16th century the name was given to similar devices, such as a kind of sledge (1552–1600), an obstacle in fortification (1788) and a tool in gold-mining (1869).[5] The verb was used of cutting through like a harrow, "ploughing" the sea, in 1582;[5] the figurative sense, to wound the feelings or distress greatly, comes from Shakespeare's Hamlet (1602–1603),[5][3][4] and the physical sense, to tear or wound, is recorded from 1633.[5] The participial adjective harrowing, extremely distressing, follows in 1810, in Scott's The Lady of the Lake.[3] Johnson (1755) described the implement as a frame of crossing timbers set with teeth, drawn over sown ground to break the clods.[13] In Scottish and English dialect it formed many compounds, such as harrow-bills, the ribs of a wooden harrow;[14] in Ulster under the harrow was said of someone going through a severe illness.[14]

Timeline

  • c. 1300 – a toothed frame dragged over ploughed land.[2][3][4] The OED dates the first record to before 1350.[5]
  • before 1325 – verb, to draw a harrow over land, in the Cursor Mundi.[3]
  • c. 1380 – in phrases and proverbs.[5]
  • 1548 – a similar device used for other purposes.[5]
  • 1582 – to cut through like a harrow, to plough the sea (now obsolete).[5]
  • 1603 – to wound the feelings of, to distress greatly, in Hamlet.[5] Barnhart dates this use to 1602.[3]
  • 1633 – to tear or wound the body.[5]
  • 1810 – harrowing, extremely distressing.[3]
  • 1841 – of land, to turn out under the harrow.[5]
  • 1876 – a diagonal formation of soldiers or of migrating birds.[5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A farm implement, a heavy frame with teeth, tines or disks, dragged over ploughed land to break up clods, level the soil, cover seed or uproot weeds.[9][11][5]
  2. A formation shaped like a harrow.[11][5]

Verb

  1. To draw a harrow over land: The field was harrowed after the spring ploughing.[9][11][5]
  2. Of soil, to break up under the harrow.[9][5]
  3. To distress greatly; to torment: The news harrowed the whole village.[9][5]
  4. To cut into or tear, as a harrow does.[11][5]

Word family

  • harrower
  • harrowing
  • restharrow
  • disc harrow

harrow2 to harry, despoil

Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
Ælfric's Homilies
Inherited from
Old English hergian via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Old English hergian

Etymology

The verb meaning to plunder is inherited from Middle English harwen, also herwen, a by-form of herien,[5][11][15][2] inherited from Old English hergian (“to harry, plunder, ravage”),[5][11][16][4][17] the source of harry.[5][7][10] The OED explains that the Old English past forms hergode and hergod and the verbal noun hergung regularly became Middle English herwede, herwed and herwyng, from which, by a change of er to ar before a consonant and by levelling, came harwe and harowe.[5] The Old English verb comes from here (“army”),[17][4] and is cognate with Old Norse herja (“to harry”), Old High German heriōn, Old Saxon heriōn and Old Frisian urheria (“to lay waste”);[17][4][16] Etymonline traces it to Proto-Germanic *harjōną, literally "to overrun with an army".[4][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

To rob and plunder, used in Old English especially of Christ harrowing hell, in Ælfric's Homilies.[5] Merriam-Webster dates the word to before the 12th century;[11] Etymonline dates the form harrow in this sense to the early 14th century.[4]

Semantic evolution

The verb lived on mainly in the Harrowing of Hell, the medieval Christian teaching that Christ, after his death, went down into hell, defeated the powers of evil and freed the souls held there;[7][4][5] the Middle English Dictionary records herien helle, to plunder hell, harrow hell.[2] The general sense of harry is still found in 1606, in Clapham's history of Great Britain,[5] and Scott wrote of a land "long harrowed by oppressor's hand".[11] Dictionaries now label the word archaic.[11][7]

Timeline

  • Old English – to harry, especially of Christ harrowing hell, in Ælfric's Homilies.[5] Merriam-Webster dates the word to before the 12th century, and Etymonline the form harrow to the early 14th century.[11][4]
  • 1606 – in the general sense of harry, to rob or plunder.[5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (archaic) To rob, plunder or lay waste; to harry.[11][5][7]
  2. (archaic) Of Christ, to go down into hell and bring away the souls of the righteous: to harrow hell.[11][7][5]

Word family

  • harrowment

Usage notes

A third harrow (also haro), an old cry of distress or alarm, has a separate source: Old French harou, haro, probably imitative.[7][11] The Anglo-Norman cry is recorded from about 1165.[18] Johnson (1755) already called the exclamation out of use.[13]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  10. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  11. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  12. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  13. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  14. ^ a b Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
  15. ^ Mayhew, A. L.; Skeat, Walter W. (1888), A Concise Dictionary of Middle English from A.D. 1150 to 1580, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  16. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  17. ^ a b c Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
  18. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Harrow.” Etymologically, 2 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/harrow. Accessed 2 Nov. 2026.

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