Etymology

withdrive

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Today it means: To drive away, repel. Full definition →

Middle English *withdriven ← Old English wiþdrīfan ← Proto-West Germanic *wiþidrīban
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The story

  1. Proto-West Germanic · inherited from*wiþidrīban“to drive back”
  2. Old English · inherited fromwiþdrīfan“to repel”
  3. Middle English · inherited from*withdriven
  4. English todaywithdrive

From Middle English *withdriven, from Old English wiþdrīfan (“to repel”), from Proto-West Germanic *wiþidrīban (“to drive back”), equivalent to with- + drive. Cognate with Old Frisian withdrīva (“to restore”). Compare also Old High German widartrīban (“to drive back, refute”), whence archaic German widertreiben (“to drive back, prevent, thwart”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.