The story
- Old English · inherited fromfornēah“very nearly, almost, about”
- Middle English · inherited fromforneh
- English todayfornigh
From Middle English forneh, forneah, from Old English fornēah (“very nearly, almost, about”), equivalent to for- + nigh. Compare similarly formed German beinah, Dutch bijna, both meaning “almost”.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.