An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/Knirps

by Friedrich Kluge

Knirps, masculine, ‘pigmy,’ Modern High German only, a Middle German word, by syncope from *knürbes, knirbes (compare Low German knirfix, Lower Rhenish knirwes), Middle English närvel, nirvel (Anglo-Saxon *cnyrfel?), ‘pigmy,’ are formed with a different diminutive termination. Allied to Suabian knorp, ‘pigmy’; and to Dutch knorf, ‘knot’?.