Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *webʰ- Proto-Indo-European *wóbʰseh₂ Proto-Germanic *wapsō Proto-West Germanic *wapsu Old English wæps Middle English wasp English wasp Inherited from Middle English wappes, waps, wasp, waspe, from Old English wæfs, wæps, wæsp, from Proto-West Germanic *wapsu, from Proto-Germanic *wapsō (“wasp”), from Proto-Indo-European *wóbʰseh₂ (“wasp”), from *webʰ- (“to braid, weave”), referring to the insect's woven nests. Cognates Cognate with North Frisian wesp (“wasp”), Saterland Frisian Häspe (“wasp”), West Frisian waps (“wasp”), Alemannic German Wespi (“wasp”), Bavarian Weps, Wepsn (“wasp”), Cimbrian bèspa (“wasp”), Dutch and Vilamovian wesp (“wasp”), German Wespe (“wasp”), Low German Weps, Wepse (“wasp”), Yiddish וועספּ (vesp), וועספּע (vespe, “wasp”), Danish hveps (“wasp”), Norwegian Bokmål veps (“wasp”), Norwegian Nynorsk kvefs (“wasp”); also Cornish goghi (“wasp”), Irish foich, foiche, puch (“wasp”), Welsh gwchi (“drone”), Latin vespa (“wasp”), Greek ανυφαίνω (anyfaíno), υφαίνω (yfaíno, “to weave”), Albanian vej (“to weave”), Latvian lapsene (“wasp”), Lithuanian vapsvà (“wasp”), Old Prussian wobse (“wasp”), Belarusian аса́ (asá, “wasp”), Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, and Ukrainian оса́ (osá, “wasp”), Czech vosa (“wasp”), Polish, Slovene, and Slovak osa (“wasp”), Serbo-Croatian о̀са, òsa (“wasp”), Armenian մոզ (moz, “a kind of fly that bites horses and cattle”), Avestan 𐬬𐬀𐬡𐬲𐬀𐬐𐬀 (vaβžaka, “scorpion”), Central Kurdish مۆز (moz, “gadfly, horsefly”), Mazanderani ماز (mâz, “fly”), Northern Kurdish moz (“wasp; gadfly, horsefly; bee; bumblebee”), Persian بوز (bavz / bowz, “wasp”), Tocharian A wäp- (“to weave”), Tocharian B wāp- (“to weave”), Sanskrit उभ्नाति (ubhnāti, “to hurt, kill; to cover”). Metathesis of /s/ and /p/ was both a process of some generality within English (compare grasp from Middle English grapsen, and—affecting other plosives—ascian ~ acsian (“to ask”)) and common in the reflexes of *wóps-eh₂ (“wasp”) in particular, as the aforementioned Germanic cognates (and non-Germanic cognates like Latin vespa) evince.

yellow jacket • yellowjacket