Etymology

sweetness

sweet·ness
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Today it means: The condition of tasting sugary or tasting as if sugary, from either sugar or another sweet-tasting substance. Full definition →

Middle English swetnes ← Old English swētnes ← Proto-West Germanic *swōtinassī
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The story

  1. Proto-West Germanic · inherited from*swōtinassī“sweetness”
  2. Old English · inherited fromswētnes“sweetness”
  3. Middle English · inherited fromswetnes
  4. English todaysweetness

From Middle English swetnes, swetnesse, from Old English swētnes (“sweetness”), from Proto-West Germanic *swōtinassī (“sweetness”), equivalent to sweet + -ness. Cognate with West Frisian swietens (“sweetness”), obsolete Dutch zoetenis (“sweetness”), Old High German swuoznessi, suoznessi (“sweetness”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.