From Old English 'cniht' (boy, servant) — one of the most dramatic semantic promotions in any language, to 'noble warrior.'
A man awarded a nonhereditary title by a sovereign; historically, a mounted warrior serving a feudal superior.
From Old English 'cniht' (boy, servant, attendant), from Proto-Germanic *knehtaz (boy, youth, servant). The original meaning was simply 'boy' or 'servant' — it had no military connotation whatsoever. The transformation from 'servant' to 'mounted warrior' to 'noble title' occurred during the 11th–12th centuries under the influence of Norman feudalism, as the mounted warrior-servant ('miles' in Latin documents) became a prestigious social rank. This is one of English's most dramatic semantic elevations: a word meaning 'boy' rose to denote the highest non-noble