An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/firn

by Friedrich Kluge

firn, adjective, ‘old, of last year,’ from Middle High German virne, adjective, ‘old,’ also ‘experienced,’ Old High German firni, ‘old’; corresponds to Gothic faírneis, ‘old,’ Anglo-Saxon fyrn, ‘old,’ Old Saxon fërn, ‘past’ (of years). The reference to the year gone by exists in the Gothic and Old Saxon words, but does not appear to be found in Old High German and Middle High German, although the stem is known to modern Upper German dialects; compare Alemannian fernig, ‘of last year.’ ‘In the preceding year’ is Middle High German vërt, vërne; Middle German and Upper German preserve even now an Old Teutonic adverb fert, fered, ‘in the preceding year’; compare Old Icelandic fjǫrþ, adverb, ‘in the preceding year,’ from Gothic *faíruþ, pre-Teutonic peruti (perouti), Greek πέρυτι, πέρυσι, ‘in the preceding year,’ Old Irish onn-urid, ‘from the preceding year onwards,’ Lithuanian pernai, ‘in the preceding year,’ Sanscrit pa-rut. Hence the idea of ‘the preceding year’ is primitively inherent in the stem per, Teutonic fer; the general sense of time gone by appears in the Teutonic adjective fern and its cognates.