The story
- Middle English · inherited fromwherfor
- English todaywherefore
From Middle English wherfor, wherfore, hwarfore, equivalent to where- (“what”) + for. Compare Dutch waarvoor (“what for, wherefore”), German wofür (“for what, what for, why”), Danish and Norwegian hvorfor (“wherefore, why”), Swedish varför (“wherefore, why”). More at where, for.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.