The story
- Old English · inherited frombefrēoġan“to free, liberate”
- Middle English · inherited from*befreen
- English todaybefree
From Middle English *befreen, *bifreen, from Old English befrēoġan (“to free, liberate”); equivalent to be- + free. Cognate with West Frisian befrije (“to liberate”), Dutch bevrijden (“to liberate, deliver”), German befreien (“to set free, liberate”), Swedish befria (“to liberate, free, deliver”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.