An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/fressen

by Friedrich Kluge

fressen, verb, ‘to eat greedily, devour, corrode,’ from Middle High German vrëȥȥen, Old High German frëȥȥen, ‘to eat up, consume, feed,’ of men and animals; derived from an earlier *fraëȥȥan, by syncope of the unaccented a, compare Gothic fraïtan, ‘to consume’ (English to fret, ‘to cut away’), with the similarly shortened preterite singular frêt, plural frêtun, for *fraét, *fraêtun. The Gothic verbal prefix occurs in other cases in Old High German as fir, far, Middle High German and Modern High German ver, and from ëȥȥen combined with this ver a new verb, verëȥȥen, is formed in Middle High German with the same meaning as frëȥȥen, which is etymologically equivalent to it. For the verbal prefix see Frevel, ver-.