Etymograph

English

snag

Snag comes from Old Norse snagi ‘clothes peg’.

  1. Old Norsec. 800–1350snagi1‘clothes peg’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500*snagge1reconstructed
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1697snag1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English snag
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1697, Virgil, The Ninth Book of the Æneis: “The coat of arms / Now on a naked…”.

Lineage

  1. Old Norsec. 800–1350snagiWiktionary, English snag‘clothes peg’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500*snaggeWiktionary, English snagreconstructed
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1697snagWiktionary, English snag. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1697, Virgil, The Ninth Book of the Æneis: “The coat of arms / Now on a naked…”

The story

From earlier snag (‘stump or branch of a tree’), from Middle English *snagge, *snage, from Old Norse snagi (‘clothes peg’) (compare Old Norse snag-hyrndr (‘snag-horned, having jagged corners’)), perhaps related to *sneganą, *snakaną (‘to crawl, creep, wind about’) if the original meaning of the root *sneg- was more like “pointy object, stinging creature”. Also see the Dutch-origin fish names snoek and snook.

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Every English word from Old Norse snagi

Today it means

noun A stump or base of a branch that has been lopped off; a short branch, or a sharp or rough branch.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “snag”. 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 / Old Norse snagi / snag

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