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Anonymous
Anonymous asked in Education & ReferenceOther - Education · 1 week ago

How did the word "Man" go from meaning humanity, to just males?

So I know that it was originally Werman and Wifman, and for Wifman it turned into woman do to them eventually removing the F and softening the I to make it sound the way it sounds now. But how did Werman become Man? How did it just completely drop the "Wer" 

1 Answer

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  • 1 week ago

    words in frequent usage in a culture end up being shortened ... there's a theory to this point [forget the name associated with it] ... the most important, frequently used words in any culture tend to be short words.

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