Etymology: < hew v.

Etymology: A Common Germanic verb; originally reduplicated. Old English héawan = Old Frisian hawa , howa , Old Saxon hauuan , hauwan (Middle Low German houwen , howen , hoggen , Middle Dutch hauwen , houwen , Dutch houwen ); Old High German houwan (Middle High German houwen , German hauen ), Old Norse hǫggva (Swedish hugga , Danish hugge ), Gothic *haggwan (not recorded); past tense, Old English héow , plural héowon = Old Saxon heu , plural heuwun (Middle Dutch hieu(w) , (hau ), houwen ), Old High German hio , hiu , plural hiowun , hiuwen (Middle High German hiu , hie , plural hiuwen , hiewen , German hieb , -en ), Old Norse hjó , plural hjoggum ; Past participle, Old English (ge)héawen = Old Saxon gihouwan (Middle Dutch gehouwen ), Old High German gihouwan (Middle High German gehouwen , German gehauen ), Old Norse högg(v)inn ; Old Germanic type *hauw- , past tense hehau- , participle hauwan- < pre-Germanic *kou- , *kow- : compare Old Church Slavonic kovą , kovati , to forge, Lithuanian káuju (káuti ) to strike, forge, kovà battle. The original reduplicated preterite appeared in Old English as héow . In Middle English, this fell together with the present stem héaw- , under the form hew . But a weak past tense hewede appeared in the 14th cent., and by 1500 superseded the strong form. A weak past participle hewed also occurs from the 14th cent., but has never been so common as the strong hewen , hewn . (The weak past tense and participle found in Middle High German, Middle Low German, and Middle Dutch are from the parallel weak verb Old High German houwôn : some refer the weak tenses in English to a weak Old English *heawian .) Derivatives from the same root are hag v.¹, hag n.² II., hag n.², hay n.¹