Etymology

kneel

K5N1E1E1L1

Today it means: To rest on one's bent knees, sometimes only one; to move to such a position. Full definition →

Middle English knelen ← Old English cnēowlian
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Old English · inherited fromcnēowlian“to kneel”
  2. Middle English · inherited fromknelen
  3. English todaykneel

From Middle English knelen, from Old English cnēowlian (“to kneel”), equivalent to knee + -le. Cognate with Dutch knielen, Low German knelen, dialectal German knielen, Alemannic German chnüle, Danish knæle, all meaning “to kneel”.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.