cringeyoudaoicibaDictYouDict[cringe 词源字典]
cringe: [13] Like crank, cringe appears to come ultimately from a prehistoric Germanic base *krank- whose original meaning was ‘bend’ or ‘curl up’. This produced an Old English verb crincan ‘fall in battle, yield’ (the association of ‘curling up’ and ‘dying’ is obvious), probable ancestor of modern English crinkle [14]. Crincan does not itself seem to be the source of cringe, which until the 16th century was usually spelled crenge or crench; to explain these eforms it is necessary to postulate *crencean, an unrecorded Old English causative derivative of crincan, meaning ‘cause to curl up’.
=> crank, crinkle[cringe etymology, cringe origin, 英语词源]
cringe (v.)youdaoicibaDictYouDict
early 13c., from causative of Old English cringan "give way, fall (in battle), become bent," from Proto-Germanic *krank- "bend, curl up" (cognates: Old Norse kringr, Dutch kring, German Kring "circle, ring"). Related: Cringed; cringing. As a noun from 1590s.