Etymology

dove

D2O1V4E1

Today it means: A pigeon, especially one smaller in size and white-colored; a bird (often arbitrarily called either a pigeon or a dove or both) of more than three hundred species of the family Columbidae. Full definition →

Middle English douve ← Old English *dūfe ← Proto-West Germanic *dūbā
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dove · noun1

  1. Proto-Indo-European*dʰewbʰ-der.?
  2. Proto-Germanic*dūbaną?
  3. Proto-Germanic*dūbǭ
  4. Proto-West Germanic*dūbā
  5. Old English*dūfe
  6. Middle Englishdouve
  7. English todaydove

From Middle English douve, dove, duve, from Old English *dūfe (“dove, pigeon”), from Proto-West Germanic *dūbā, from Proto-Germanic *dūbǭ (“dove, pigeon”). Cognate with Scots doo, dow, Saterland Frisian Duuwe, West Frisian do, Dutch duif, Afrikaans duif, Sranan Tongo doifi, German Taube, German Low German Duuv, Dutch Low Saxon duve, doeve, Danish due, Faroese dúgva, Icelandic dúfa, Norwegian Bokmål due, Norwegian Nynorsk due, Swedish duva, Yiddish טויב (toyb), Gothic *𐌳𐌿𐌱𐍉 (*dubō).

dove · verb2

A modern formation of the strong conjugation, by analogy with drive → drove and weave → wove.

Dove · proper noun3

  1. Scottish Gaelic · calque of(mac) Calmáin“(son of the) dove”
  2. English todayDove

* As an English surname, from the noun dove. * As a Scottish surname, calque of Scottish Gaelic (mac) Calmáin (“(son of the) dove”). Compare Coleman. * Also as a Scottish surname, variant of Duff. * As a north German surname, from the Low German adjective doof (“deaf”); see deaf.

Words from the same roots

Old English*dūfe all →

Dufton

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.