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Origin and history of thane

thane(n.)

Middle English thein, from Old English þegn "military follower, one who holds lands in exchange for military service," also "vassal, retainer, attendant," from Proto-Germanic *thegnas (source also of Old Saxon thegan "(free) follower, warrior; boy, youngling," Old Norse þegn "thane, freeman," Old High German thegan, German Degen "thane, warrior, hero").

This is reconstructed to be from PIE *tek-no- (source also of Sanskrit takman "descendant, child," Greek teknon "child; young animal, shoot"), from root *tek- "to beget, give birth to" (source also of Greek tekos "child, the young of animals," tokos "childbirth, offspring, produce of money, interest"). However, Beekes writes that the identification of the Greek and Germanic words is "not without problems" caused by phonetics.

Also used in Old English for "disciple of Christ." The specific sense of "man who ranks between an earl and a freeman" is late 15c.

The modern spelling is from Scottish, where early 13c. it came to mean "chief of a clan, king's baron," and it has predominated in English probably due to the influence of "Macbeth;" normal orthographic changes from Old English ðegn would have produced Modern English *thain. Some historians now use thegn to distinguish Anglo-Saxon thanes from Scottish thanes.

Entries linking to thane

dirndl(n.)

style of women's dress imitating Alpine peasant costume, with bodice and full skirt, 1937 (from 1921 as a German word in articles on German fashion), from German dialectal diminutive of dirne "girl" (in dirndlkleid "peasant dress"), from a diminutive of Middle High German dierne "maid," from Old High German thiorna, which is related to Old English þegn (see thane). English in 14c. had therne "girl, maid, young woman" from the Old Norse cognate þerna.

disciple(n.)

Old English discipul (fem. discipula), "one who follows another for the purpose of learning," especially "the personal followers of Jesus Christ during his life, the twelve Apostles chosen or called by him to be his immediate associates," a Biblical borrowing from Latin discipulus "pupil, student, follower," which is of uncertain origin.

In OED (1989) and Watkins it is said to be from discere "to learn," from a reduplicated form of the PIE root *dek- "to take, accept." But according to Barnhart and Klein, it is from a lost compound *discipere "to grasp intellectually, analyze thoroughly," from dis- "apart" (see dis-) + capere "to take, take hold of," from PIE root *kap- "to grasp." De Vaan finds the ending -pulus "difficult to explain" in the former theory and finds the latter theory "semantically not compelling."

It was not common in Old English, where the usual word was leorningcniht, and in some cases þegn (see thane). The pre-Christian Latin sense of "scholar, pupil, student" is rare in English. Meaning "one who follows or is influenced by the doctrine or example of another" is from c. 1300.

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lord
mid-13c., laverd, loverd, from Old English hlaford "master of a household, ruler, feudal lord, superior; husband," also "God," translating Latin dominus, Greek kyrios in the New Testament, Hebrew yahweh in the Old (though Old English dryhten was more frequent). Old English hlafor
citizen
c. 1300, citisein (fem. citeseine) "inhabitant of a city or town," from Anglo-French citesein, citezein "city-dweller, town-dweller, citizen" (Old French citeien, 12c., Modern French citoyen), from cite (see city) + -ain (see -ian). According to Middle English Compendium, the -s-
noble
c. 1200, "illustrious, distinguished, of high rank or birth," from Old French noble "of noble bearing or birth," from Latin nobilis "well-known, famous, renowned; excellent, superior, splendid; high-born, of superior birth," earlier *gnobilis, literally "knowable," from gnoscere
trivia
"trivialities, bits of information of little consequence," by 1932, from the title of a popular book by U.S.-born British aphorist Logan Pearsall Smith (1865-1946) first published in 1902 but popularized in 1918 (with "More Trivia" following in 1921 and a collected edition includ
renounce
late 14c., renouncen, "give up (something, especially to another), resign, surrender," from Old French renoncier "give up, cede" (12c., Modern French renoncer) and directly from Latin renuntiare "bring back word; proclaim; protest against, renounce," from re- "against" (see re-)
Jurassic
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Mediterranean
"the sea between southern Europe and northern Africa," 1590s, earlier Mediterranie (c. 1400), from Late Latin Mediterraneum mare "Mediterranean Sea" (7c.), from Latin mediterraneus "midland, surrounded by land, in the midst of an expanse of land" (but in reference to the body of
conspiracy
mid-14c., "a plotting of evil, unlawful design; a combination of persons for an evil purpose," from Anglo-French conspiracie, Old French conspiracie "conspiracy, plot," from Latin conspirationem (nominative conspiratio) "agreement, union, unanimity," noun of action from past-part
hangover
also hang-over, 1894, "a survival, a thing left over from before," from hang (v.) + over. Meaning "after-effect of excessive drinking" is attested by 1902, American English, on notion of something left over from the night before. As an adjective, in reference to a person, overhun
just
late 14c., "morally upright, righteous in the eyes of God" ("Now chiefly as a Biblical archaism" - OED, 1989); also "equitable, fair, impartial in one's dealings;" also "fitting, proper, conforming to standards or rules;" also "justifiable, reasonable;" from Old French juste

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