nursenurse

Nurse comes from Middle English norice, from Old French norrice, from Late Latin nūtrīcia, from Latin nūtrīcius ‘nourishing’, from nūtrīx.

1. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEnūtriō¹‘to suckle’
2. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEnūtrīx¹‘wet nurse’
3. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEnūtrīcius¹‘that which nourishes’
4. Late Latinc. 200–600 CEnūtrīcia¹
5. Old Frenchc. 842–1400norrice¹‘wet nurse’
6. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500norice¹‘wet nurse’
7. Englishearliest quotation 1790nurse¹

1. ¹ Wiktionary, English nurse
2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1790, Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France: “the nurse of manly sentiment and heroic enterprise”.