An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/Stirn

by Friedrich Kluge

Stirn, feminine, ‘forehead, brow,’ from the equivalent Middle High German stirne, Old High German stirna (for *sternja), feminine; a specifically High German word (yet also in Anglo-Saxon steornêde, ‘frontosus’?), for which Dutch voorhoofd, Anglo-Saxon foranheáfod, English forehead (Old Icelandic enne, Gothic *anþi, Old High German ęndi, equivalent to Latin antiae), occur. In Bavarian, Hirn is generally used instead of Stirn. The form *sternjô- has been connected with Greek στέρνον, ‘breast,’ while ‘broad’ is assumed to be the intermediate idea, which is deduced from the root ster, in Latin sternere and Greek στρώννυμι, ‘to spread out’; compare Old Slovenian strana, ‘district.’