The Origin of “Can”
In my Chaucer class today I learned something amazing—where the word “can” comes from. In the Canterbury Tales you often see phrases like this one:
What ladyes fairest been or best daunsynge,
Or which of hem kan dauncen best and synge
where “kan” means “know how.” (The word “dauncen” is in the infinitive form, so we would write it today as “to dance,” not just “dance,” and the phrase would go “or which of them knows how to dance best and sing.”) Often, Chaucer uses the word in the past tense, thus:
In al this world, to seken up and doun,
There nys no man so wys that koude thenche
So gay a popelote or swich a wenche.
Here, “koude thenche” means something in between “knew how to think” and “was able to think.”
So our word “can” comes from the Middle English “kan.” “Kan” comes from the same root as our modern “know” (see the k and the n in there?), which dates back a long way—you can see it in the Greek word “ginosko,” which is familiar to many students of the New Testament.