Etymograph

English

neck

Neck comes from Middle English nekke, from Old English hnecca ‘back of the neck’, from Proto-Germanic *hnakkô ‘nape’.

  1. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*hnakkô1‘nape’reconstructed
  2. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*hnakkō1‘nape’reconstructed
  3. Old Englishc. 450–1150hnecca1‘back of the neck’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500nekke1‘the neck’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1837neck1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English neck
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1837, R. A. R., The Everyday Book: “The person with 'the neck' stands in the centre,…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*hnakkôWiktionary, English neck‘nape’reconstructed
  2. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*hnakkōWiktionary, English neck‘nape’reconstructed
  3. Old Englishc. 450–1150hneccaWiktionary, English neck‘back of the neck’
  4. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500nekkeWiktionary, English neck‘the neck’
  5. Englishearliest quotation 1837neckWiktionary, English neck. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1837, R. A. R., The Everyday Book: “The person with 'the neck' stands in the centre,…”

The story

Possibly a mutated variant of *kneug/k (compare Old English hnocc (‘hook, penis’), Welsh cnwch (‘joint, knob’), Latvian knaūķis (‘dwarf’).

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Explore everything descended from *hnakkô →

Another origin of neck

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*nigʷ-uncertain
  2. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*nikwiz-reconstructed
  3. Old Norsec. 800–1350nykr‘a water-demon, the nixie, the nick’
  4. Old Danishmodernnøken
  5. Danishmodernnøkke‘a water-demon, the nixie, the nick’
  6. Englishtodayneck

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Today it means

noun The part of the body connecting the head and the trunk found in humans and some animals.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “neck”. 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-Germanic *hnakkô / neck