grind: [OE] Grind is part of the ancient Indo- European word-stock. Relatives such as Latin frendere ‘crush’ and Lithuanian grendu ‘rub’ point back to an Indo-European *ghrendh-. This perhaps denoted ‘crushing’ rather than what we would today call ‘grinding’; for in earliest times grain was crushed rather than ground to produce meal. The connotations of the word seem to have changed in step with advances in grainpulverizing technology. (The same is true, incidentally, in the case of Indo-European *mel-, which produced the majority of modern European words for ‘grind’, from German mahlen and Spanish moler to Russian molot’, and also gave English meal, mill, molar, etc.) Grist [OE] was formed from the same base as produced grind, and until the 15th century meant simply ‘grinding’. => grist
