Etymology: A word of which the stem varies, not only in English, but in the other Germanic languages. The recorded Old English type was hás (Middle English hôs, Scottish hāse), corresponding to Old High German, Middle High German, Old Low German heis, Old Saxon hês, Middle Dutch hees, Low German hês < Germanic *haiso-. But beside this Middle English had hôrs, hoors, now hoarse, Scottish hairse, hairsh, hearsh. Although written evidence for the r forms goes back only to c1400, the correspondence of modern English hoarse and Scottish hairse implies the existence of an unrecorded Old English *hárs beside hás. The Old Norse normal representation of Germanic *haiso-z would be *heiss, instead of which Old Norse had háss, apparently to be explained as for *hárs < *hairso- (original ai before r gave á in Old Norse). The Old Flemish heersch, recorded by Kilian beside heesch, appears to go back similarly to an Old Low German *heirs. For these and other reasons it is now generally held that *hairso- was the original Germanic type, and that the r subsequently disappeared at different times in most of the dialects. The southern Scotch hairsh, hearsh, appears to exemplify a frequent Scottish interchange of rs and rsh, seen e.g. in farce, farsch, scarce, scairsh, Erse, Ersch, etc.

Etymology: < hoarse adj.