An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/meiden

by Friedrich Kluge

meiden, verb, ‘to avoid, shun, refrain,’ from Middle High German mîden, ‘to dispense with, suffer want, eschew, forsake, refrain from’; Old High German mîdan, ‘to hide oneself from, keep secret, eschew, refrain from’; compare Old Saxon mîthan, Anglo-Saxon mîðan, ‘to hide, conceal, refrain from.’ The original sense of the cognates seems to be ‘to hide, remain far from,’ but definitely related terms are wanting; Latin amitto, Lithuanian pa-metù, ‘to thrown away,’ are not connected. For other words similar in sound see under miß and missen.