An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/Hain

by Friedrich Kluge

Hain, masculine, ‘grove,’ made current by Klopstock as a poetical term. The form of the word, as is shown under Hagen (1), may be traced back to Middle High German, in which, however, Hain is but a rare variant of Hagen; it signified originally ‘thorn-bush, thorn, fence, abatis, enclosed place.’ Thus the word does not imply the idea of sacredness which Klopstock blended with it.