sow: English has two words sow, both of which go back to the Old English period. The verb, ‘put seeds in the ground’, comes from a prehistoric Germanic *sǣjan, which also produced German säen, Dutch zaaien, Swedish så, and Danish saa. It was formed from the base *sǣ- (source of English seed), which goes back ultimately to Indo-European *sē- (source of English season, semen, etc). Sow ‘female pig’ is descended from an Indo-European base *su- (possibly imitative of the noise made by a pig), which also produced Greek hus ‘pig’ (whose feminine form húaina is the source of English hyena [16]), Latin sūs ‘pig’, German sau ‘sow’, and English swine. => season, seed, semen; hyena, swine
sow (v.)
Old English sawan "to scatter seed upon the ground or plant it in the earth, disseminate" (class VII strong verb; past tense seow, past participle sawen), from Proto-Germanic *sean (cognates: Old Norse sa, Old Saxon saian, Middle Dutch sayen, Dutch zaaien, Old High German sawen, German säen, Gothic saian), from PIE root *se- (1) "to sow" (cognates: Latin sero, past tense sevi, past participle satum "to sow;" Old Church Slavonic sejo, sejati; Lithuanian seju, seti "to sow"), source of semen, season (n.), seed (n.), etc. Figurative sense was in Old English.
sow (n.)
Old English sugu, su "female of the swine," from Proto-Germanic *su- (cognates: Old Saxon, Old High German su, German Sau, Dutch zeug, Old Norse syr), from PIE root *su- (cognates: Sanskrit sukarah "wild boar, swine;" Avestan hu "wild boar;" Greek hys "swine;" Latin sus "swine," swinus "pertaining to swine;" Old Church Slavonic svinija "swine;" Lettish sivens "young pig;" Welsh hucc, Irish suig "swine; Old Irish socc "snout, plowshare"), possibly imitative of pig noise, a notion reinforced by the fact that Sanskrit sukharah means "maker of (the sound) 'su.' " Related to swine. As a term of abuse for a woman, attested from c. 1500. Sow-bug "hog louse" is from 1750.
