Etymology

clothing

cloth·ing
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Today it means: Any of a wide variety of articles, usually made of fabrics, animal hair, animal skin, or some combination thereof, used to cover the human body for warmth, to preserve modesty, or for fashion. Full definition →

Middle English clothing ← Old English *clāþung ← Proto-West Germanic *klaiþungu
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The story

  1. Proto-West Germanic · inherited from*klaiþungu“clothing”
  2. Old English · inherited from*clāþung
  3. Middle English · inherited fromclothing
  4. English todayclothing

From Middle English clothing, clathing, from Old English *clāþung, from Proto-West Germanic *klaiþungu (“clothing”), equivalent to clothe + -ing. Cognate with Scots clathing, claithing (“clothing”), Saterland Frisian Klodenge (“clothing”), West Frisian klaaiïng (“clothing”), Dutch kleding (“clothing”), German Kleidung (“clothing”), Danish klædning (“clothing, dress, attire”), Swedish kläding, klädning (“clothing, dress”). Doublet of the dialectal English term cleading, from Middle English clething; compare also cladding.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.