The story
- Middle English · inherited fromquaveren
- English todayquaver
From Middle English quaveren, frequentative form of quaven, cwavien (“to tremble”), equivalent to quave + -er. Cognate with Low German quabbeln (“to quiver”), German quabbeln, quappeln (“to quiver”). More at quave, quab, quiver.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.