Etymograph

English

miss

Miss comes from Old English missan ‘to miss’, from Proto-Germanic *missijaną ‘to miss, go wrong’, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *meyth₂- ‘to change’.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*meyth₂-1‘to change’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*missijaną1‘to miss’reconstructed
  3. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*missijan1‘to go wrong’reconstructed
  4. Old Englishc. 450–1150missan1‘to miss’
  5. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500missen1
  6. Englishearliest quotation 1590miss1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English miss
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1590, Edmund Spenser, Book III, Canto IX: “Emongst the Angels, a whole legione / Of wicked…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*meyth₂-Wiktionary, English miss‘to change’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*missijanąWiktionary, English miss‘to miss’reconstructed
  3. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*missijanWiktionary, English miss‘to go wrong’reconstructed
  4. Old Englishc. 450–1150missanWiktionary, English miss‘to miss’
  5. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500missenWiktionary, English miss
  6. Englishearliest quotation 1590missWiktionary, English miss. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1590, Edmund Spenser, Book III, Canto IX: “Emongst the Angels, a whole legione / Of wicked…”

The story

Related also to Scots mis (‘wrongdoing, sin, guilt’), Dutch mis (‘misdeed, wrongdoing, mistake’), Middle Low German misse (‘sin, wrong’).

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Word family

English words that share an ancestor with miss, grouped by the ancestor they share, most familiar first.

through Proto-Indo-European *meyth₂- ‘to change, exchange, trade’

  • mad ← ġemǣdan ← *mǣdan ← *maidijaną ← *moyth₂-éye-ti
  • message ← missāticum ← mittere
  • commission ← commissioun ← commissiō ← committō ← mittō
  • mess ← mes ← mēse ← mē(n)sa ← mittō
  • commit ← committen ← committō ← mittō ← mītō
  • mute ← mutō
  • mutant ← mūtāns ← mūtō
  • madden ← mad ← ġemǣdan ← *mǣdan ← *maidijaną
  • premise ← premisse ← premissa ← praemittere ← mittō
  • intermittent ← intermittens ← mittens ← mittō ← mītō
  • omit ← omitten ← omittō ← *ommittō ← mittō
  • mutate ← mūtō

25 more relatives in the full family tree

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Today it means

verb To fail to hit, catch, grasp, etc.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “miss”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.

Etymograph / Proto-Indo-European *meyth₂- / miss