An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/meuchel-

by Friedrich Kluge

meuchel-, derived, as the first part of a compound, from Middle High German miuchel-, ‘secret.’ Earlier Modern High German Meuchler, from the equivalent Middle High German miuchelœre, miucheler, late Old High German mûhhilâri, masculine, ‘plotter, assassin.’ Allied to Middle High German miuchelingen, ‘insidiously, like an assassin’; Old High German mühhilswërt, ‘assassin's sword, sword for assassination'; Old High German mûhhari, mûhho, mûhheo, ‘brigand, footpad’; also mûhhen, mûhhôn, ‘to attack from an ambush'; Middle High German vermûchen, ‘to get out of the way secretly, conceal,’ and Middle High German mocken, ‘to lie hidden’; further English dialectic to mitch (Anglo-Saxon *mŷčan), ‘to he hidden,’ Middle English micher, ‘thief.’ The entire class points to a Teutonic root mûk, ‘to lurk in ambush with weapons’; a pre-Teutonic root mûg appears in Keltic; compare Old Irish formúicthe, formúichthai, ‘absconditus,’ formúichdetu, ‘occultatio.’ Since these words well accord in meaning with the High German cognates, Gothic *muks, Old Icelandic mjúkr, English meek (to which Dutch meuk, ‘mellow, ripe’ is allied), cannot be associated with them, since their meaning does not correspond to that of the class under discussion. See mucken and munkeln.