Origins
The verb 'hate' is one of the oldest and most emotionally charged words in English, and its etymology reveals that the concept it names has been linguistically stable for thousands of years. Unlike many emotion words that have shifted, softened, or reversed their meanings over time, 'hate' has designated intense aversion since before the Germanic languages separated from each other.
The Old English form was 'hatian,' meaning 'to hate, to regard as an enemy, to persecute.' The related noun 'hete' meant 'hatred, hostility, persecution,' and the adjective 'hatol' meant 'hostile, hateful.' This full family of forms descends from Proto-Germanic *hatōną (verb, to hate) and *hataz (noun, hatred), built on a root that appears across all the early Germanic languages with remarkable consistency of meaning.
The Germanic forms derive from the Proto-Indo-European root *keh₂d-, which carried the sense of 'sorrow' or 'hatred.' The most revealing cognate outside Germanic is Greek 'kēdos' (κῆδος), which means 'care,' 'concern,' 'grief,' and particularly 'mourning for the dead.' The related Greek verb 'kēdein' meant 'to trouble, to be anxious about.' This semantic range suggests that the original PIE root may have expressed a complex of negative emotion broader than simple hatred — something closer to 'deep emotional distress' or 'grievous concern' — and that the Germanic branch narrowed it to the specific pole of hostile aversion while Greek preserved the sorrowful, caring dimension.
Old English Period
The noun 'hatred' is a Middle English formation, combining 'hate' with the suffix '-red' (condition, state), from Old English 'rǣden' (condition, stipulation). This suffix also appears in 'kindred' (the condition of being kin). The form displaced the older Old English noun 'hete,' though the pattern of a separate abstract noun formed with a suffix suggests that speakers felt the need for a word distinguishing the state of hating from the act of hating.
The semantic history of 'hate' in English is notable for its lack of semantic drift. While the word has always been capable of hyperbolic, casual use ('I hate rainy days'), its core meaning of intense, deeply felt aversion has not changed since Old English. Compare this stability with the dramatic shifts undergone by words like 'nice' (from Latin 'nescius,' ignorant), 'silly' (from Old English 'sǣlig,' blessed), or 'awful' (originally 'full of awe') — words whose modern meanings bear no resemblance to their origins. Hate has meant hate for as long as English has existed.
In Old English literature, 'hatian' and its derivatives appear frequently in heroic and religious contexts. The Beowulf poet uses related forms to describe the enmity between Grendel and the Danes, and in Old English religious prose, hatred is treated as a spiritual failing opposed to Christian love. The Anglo-Saxon homilist Wulfstan, in his famous 'Sermon of the Wolf to the English,' catalogs hatred among the sins destroying English society.
Word Formation
The modern compound 'hate crime,' first attested in the 1980s, represents a significant legal and cultural development — the codification of hatred as an aggravating factor in criminal law. The word's ancient power and clarity made it the natural choice for this concept: no softer term would have carried the same moral weight.