Etymologically
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wife

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /waɪf/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English wif, inherited from Old English wīf (“woman; wife”),[2][3][4] from Proto-Germanic *wībą,[2][3] a word of uncertain origin and disputed etymology,[3][2][4] not found in Gothic.[3] Its cognates include Old Frisian wīf, Old Saxon wīf, Dutch wijf, German Weib (“woman”) and Old Norse víf.[2][3][4] Klein and Merriam-Webster connect it with Old Norse veipr (“head covering”), as if it meant “the veiled one”,[5][6] and Merriam-Webster's Collegiate compares Tocharian B kwīpe.[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

A woman, in the general sense: Old English wīf, about 725.[8] A woman joined to a man by marriage is from about 888.[8]

Semantic evolution

Etymonline notes that the sense “female partner in a sanctioned union” arose in late Old English.[3] The general sense “woman” survives in fishwife, midwife and old wives' tale,[2][9][10] and in Scotland, where wife is still used of a middle-aged or elderly woman.[4][10] In Middle English it also meant the mistress of a household, a sense surviving in goodwife and housewife.[9] Trench saw it as one of many words, like Greek gynḗ and German Weib, that meant first “woman” and later “wife”.[11] The verb “to take a wife” is from 1387, rare beside wive.[8][3] All the world and his wife, “everyone”, is first recorded in 1730.[10]

Timeline

  • c. 725 – Old English wīf, a woman.[8]
  • c. 888 – a married woman.[8]
  • 14th century – mistress of a household.[9]
  • 1387 – verb, to marry.[8]
  • 1730 – all the world and his wife.[10]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A woman joined to a man in marriage; a female spouse.
  2. (archaic, Scotland) A woman, especially a middle-aged or elderly one.

Word family

  • wifehood
  • wifeless
  • wifedom
  • wifelessness
  • farmwife
  • wifelike
  • wive
  • woman
  • midwife
  • housewife
  • fishwife
  • husband

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  6. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  7. ^ Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  8. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  9. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  10. ^ a b c d Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  11. ^ Trench, Richard Chenevix (1859), A Select Glossary of English Words Used Formerly in Senses Different from Their Present, London: John W. Parker