Etymology

half

H4A1L1F4

Today it means: One of two usually roughly equal parts into which anything may be divided, or considered as divided. Full definition →

Middle English half ← Old English healf ← Proto-West Germanic *halb
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The story

  1. Proto-Germanic · inherited from*halbaz
  2. Proto-West Germanic · inherited from*halb
  3. Old English · inherited fromhealf“half”
  4. Middle English · inherited fromhalf
  5. English todayhalf

From Middle English half, halfe from Old English healf (“half”); as a noun, 'half', 'side', 'part', from Proto-West Germanic *halb, from Proto-Germanic *halbaz. Cognates Cognate with Old Saxon, Old Frisian, and Old Dutch half, West Frisian heal, Dutch half, German halb, Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish halv, Icelandic hálfur and Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌻𐌱𐍃 (halbs). Compare halve, behalf.

Words from the same roots

Old Englishhealf all →

halfpenny

Proto-Germanic*halbaz all →

halve

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.