An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/Katze

by Friedrich Kluge

Katze, feminine, ‘cat,’ from the equivalent Middle High German katze, Old High German chazza, feminine; a common European word in the Mid. Ages and in modern times; of obscure origin. Compare also Anglo-Saxon catt, masculine, English cat; Old Icelandic kǫttr, masculine. These assume Gothic *katta, *kattus. Early Middle Latin cattus and its Romance derivatives (Italian gatto, French chat), Irish and Gaelic cat, masculine, and Slavonic kotǔ, ‘tom-cat,’ Lithuanian katě, ‘cat', kátinas, ‘tom-cat’ (allied to Servian kotiti, ‘to litter,’ &c., kot, ‘brood, litter’), suggest the possibility that the Teutonic term was borrowed from a neighbouring race after the period of the Teutonic substitution of consonants, at latest a century before or after the migration of the tribes. It is a remarkable fact, however, that German retains a primary and independent masculine form of the word in Kater (Gothic *kaduza?), which also occurs in Dutch and Low German kater (compare English caterwaul).