Etymology

daughter

daugh·ter
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Today it means: One’s female offspring. Full definition →

Middle English doghter ← Old English dohtor ← Proto-West Germanic *dohter
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The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European · inherited from*dʰugh₂tḗr
  2. Proto-Germanic · inherited from*duhtēr
  3. Proto-West Germanic · inherited from*dohter
  4. Old English · inherited fromdohtor“daughter”
  5. Middle English · inherited fromdoghter
  6. English todaydaughter

From Middle English doghter, doughter, from Old English dohtor (“daughter”), from Proto-West Germanic *dohter, from Proto-Germanic *duhtēr, from Proto-Indo-European *dʰugh₂tḗr.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.