Etymology

sweep

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Today it means: To clean (a surface) by means of a stroking motion of a broom or brush. Full definition →

Middle English swepen ← Proto-West Germanic *swaipijan ← Proto-Germanic *swaipijaną
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The story

  1. Proto-Germanic · inherited from*swaipijaną
  2. Proto-West Germanic · inherited from*swaipijan
  3. Middle English · inherited fromswepen
  4. English todaysweep

From Middle English swepen, from Proto-West Germanic *swaipijan (unattested in Old English), from Proto-Germanic *swaipijaną. Cognate with Early Modern West Frisian swiepe (“whip, cleanse, sweep”), from Old Frisian swēpa, suepa (“sweep”). More distantly related to Old Norse sveipa (whence Swedish svepa). See also swoop.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.