Where does “cunning” come from?
cunning (Middle English) comes from Middle English cunninde, from Old English cunnende, from Old English cunnan, from Proto-West Germanic kunnan, from Proto-Germanic kunnaną, from Proto-Indo-European ǵneh₃- — to know.
Ancestry of “cunning”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|
| 1 | Middle English | cunninde | — |
| 2 | Old English | cunnende | — |
| 3 | Old English | cunnan | to know, to be familiar with; can, to know how |
| 4 | Proto-West Germanic | kunnan | to recognise; to know how, to be able |
| 5 | Proto-Germanic | kunnaną | to know, to be familiar with, to recognise; to... |
| 6 | Proto-Indo-European | ǵneh₃- | to know |
Words derived from “cunning”