Witch (word)

The word witch derives from the Old English nouns /ˈwɪttʃɑː/ "sorcerer, male witch" and /ˈwɪttʃeɪ/ "sorceress, female witch". The word's further origins in Proto-Germanic and Proto-Indo-European are unclear.

The Old English verb has a cognate in Middle Low German (attested from the 13th century, besides "to bewitch"). The further etymology of this word is problematic. It has no clear cognates in Germanic outside of English and Low German, and there are numerous possibilities for the Indo-European root from which it may have been derived.

Other suggestions for the underlying root are untenable or widely rejected:

Old English also had "witch, fury", whence Modern English hag, of uncertain origin, but cognate to German , from an Old High German , Common Germanic *haga-tusjon- (OED), perhaps from a *tesvian "to mar, damage", meaning "field-damager" (the suggestion of Grimm). The element hag- originally means "fence, wooden enclosure", and hence also "enclosed fields, cultivated land".

Other Old English synonyms of wicca and wicce include gealdricge, scinlæce, hellrúne.

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