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Etymology and origin of the English word maw

Pronunciation

maw1 stomach, jaws

Confidence
Established
Formation
Inherited
First attested
800 before 800, Corpus Glossary
Inherited from
Old English maga via Middle English
Ultimate origin
Proto-Germanic *magô

Etymology

The word for the stomach is inherited from Middle English maue, also mawe and early mahe,[2][3][4][5] inherited from Old English maga (“stomach”),[6][3][5][7][8] from Proto-Germanic *magô.[1][9][10] It is cognate with Old Frisian maga, Middle Dutch maghe (now maag), Old High German mago (now German Magen), Old Norse magi, Swedish mage and Danish mave.[6][3][4][8] The OED, Barnhart and Etymonline connect it further, perhaps, with Welsh megin (“bellows”) and Lithuanian makas (“purse, pouch”), and with Slavic words for a bag or pouch,[6][4][3] and Etymonline and Barnhart trace the group to Proto-Indo-European *mak- (“leather bag”).[3][4] Kroonen, however, calls it a European word with no Indo-European etymology, whose plain k may point to a non-Indo-European source.[9]

Earliest recorded meaning

The stomach: in the Corpus Glossary, an Old English glossary that Barnhart dates before 800.[6][4] In Old English the word was used of the stomachs of people and animals, including fish and birds.[3][7] The Middle English form mahe appears in the Ancrene Riwle, probably before 1200.[4]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English maue was the human stomach, also appetite for food, and the stomach of a fish.[2] It could also name other inner parts: the chest, the belly, the liver and the womb, senses now all obsolete.[6] Chaucer used it three times.[11] It was used figuratively from about 1390.[6] Its use for the throat, gullet and jaws of a greedy animal dates from the late 14th century, as does its use as a figure of greed.[3][6] From 1601 to 1765 to have a maw to meant to have a liking for something.[6] Johnson (1755) defined it as the stomach of animals, and of human beings "in contempt".[12] In Modern English it is said of animals, and of people only as an insult or a joke,[3][6] although in Scotland and much of England dialect speakers still used it for the human stomach in the 19th century.[13] Since Keats (1818) it has also been used of anything that seems to swallow things up.[6][14]

Timeline

  • before 1200 – the chest (obsolete).[6]
  • c. 1325 – the belly, the abdominal cavity (obsolete by 1500).[6]
  • before 1382 – the liver (obsolete by 1530).[6]
  • c. 1390 – in figurative use, in Chaucer's Shipman's Tale.[6]
  • c. 1390 – the womb (obsolete by 1611).[6]
  • c. 1450 – the throat, gullet or jaws of a voracious animal.[6]
  • 1586 – the crop of a bird (obsolete by 1731).[6]
  • 1601 – appetite, liking, in to have a maw to (obsolete by 1765).[6]
  • 1818 – anything that seems to swallow things up, in Keats's Endymion.[6]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The mouth, throat or jaws of a voracious animal: the wolf's open maw.[15][14][6]
  2. The stomach or crop of an animal; humorously or insultingly, the stomach or mouth of a greedy person.[15][6][14]
  3. Something that seems to swallow things up, like hungry jaws: the maw of the furnace.[14][6]
  4. (obsolete, 1601–1765) Appetite or inclination.[6][14]

Word family

  • maw-worm
  • mawed

maw2 card game

Confidence
Uncertain
Formation
Borrowing
First attested
1548 W. Forrest, Pleasaunt Poesye
Borrowed from
Irish mámh
Ultimate origin
Irish mámh

Etymology

The word for the card game is of uncertain origin:[6][16][14] the OED suggests that it is perhaps borrowed from Irish mámh (“trump”).[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

A trick-taking card game: 1548, in William Forrest's Pleasaunt Poesye.[6]

Semantic evolution

In this game, played in Ireland and Scotland, the highest trump was the five, formerly called the five-finger.[6] The Shorter Oxford calls it a Gaelic game from which twenty-five and spoil five developed, and Merriam-Webster an early form of spoil five.[16][14] In the late 16th and early 17th centuries one could heave at maw (play maw) and have a set at maw (a game of it), and a help at maw was a resource or a means of evasion.[6] The English Dialect Dictionary records it as an obsolete Lancashire game for two to six players, with a piquet pack of 36 cards.[13]

Timeline

  • 1548 – a card game.[6]
  • 1575 – to heave at maw, to play maw (obsolete by 1612).[6]
  • 1592 – a help at maw, a resource or means of evasion (obsolete by 1678).[6]
  • 1595 – a set at maw, a game of maw (obsolete by 1633).[6]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (historical) A card game played in Ireland and Scotland, in which the five of trumps is the highest card; a forerunner of spoil five.[6][16][14]

Usage notes

Several other words are spelled maw.[6][16] A Scottish and northern word for the mallow, recorded from before 1400, probably comes from Anglo-Norman according to the OED,[6] though the Shorter Oxford takes it as a reduced form of mallow.[16] A Scottish word for a gull, from before 1513, probably comes from Old Norse and is related to mew.[6][16][14] A verb maw, "of a cat, to mew", from Dutch, is recorded from 1481, and maw as an imitation of a cat's cry from 1692.[6] In the United States maw (from 1826) is a regional spelling of ma, mother.[6][16]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b 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 Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  5. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  6. ^ 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 36 37 38 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
  8. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  9. ^ a b Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  10. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
  11. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
  12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  13. ^ 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)
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  15. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  16. ^ 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

Related etymologies

Cite this entry

“Maw.” Etymologically, 8 Nov. 2026, etymologically.com/en/maw. Accessed 9 Nov. 2026.

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