Other forms: waifs, waives
A waif is a homeless neglected child. A ragged waif, waifs and strays, look like a waif.
Waifs and strays is the fixed phrase and once meant unclaimed property and wandering animals, which is exactly where the word comes from — a waif was something ownerless that the crown could seize. Applied to a fashion model it means very thin.
1nounwaifA homeless neglected child.
“In the story, a kind old baker takes in a hungry little waif from the streets.”
waif is a child.
The old word meant property that was lost and that nobody came to claim. A waif is a child nobody has claimed.
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Middle English weif meant ownerless property liable to seizure, from an Anglo-Norman legal term.
Proto-Indo-European
*weyp- — to oscillate, swing
Proto-Germanic
*waif-
Old Norse
veif — flag; waving thing
Old French
waif
Anglo-Norman
waif
Middle English
weif — ownerless property subject to seizure and forfeiture; the right of such seizure and forfeiture; revenues obtained from such seizure and forfeiture
English, today
waif
Built from
The noun is derived from Late Middle English weif (“ownerless property subject to seizure and forfeiture; the right of such seizure and forfeiture; revenues obtained from such seizure and forfeiture”)waif, waife, wafe, wayf, wayffe, (Early Middle English) waiph, waive, from Anglo-Norman waif, weifgwayf, waiffe, waive, wayf, weyf (compare Anglo-Latin waivumwaifum, wayvium, weivium, weyvium, Medieval Latin waivium), possibly from Old French waif, a variant of gaif, gayf (“property that is lost and unclaimed; of property: lost and unclaimed”) Normanguaif, probably from a gmq - source such as Old Norse veif (“flag; waving thing”), from Proto-Germanic waif-, from Proto-Indo-European weyp- (“to oscillate, swing”). The verb is derived from the noun.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA