Youngster
/ˈjʌŋ.stər/noun
A young person; especially a child or adolescent.
Did you know?The ending -ster once had a more active, often agentive force in English, which is why it also appears in words like *spinster* and *gangster*—not magic, but a real fossil of old word-formation power.
Etymological Timeline
Proto-Indo-European
PIE
*yeu̯-
“to be young, vital, or vigorous”
Old English
OE
geong
“young, youthful”
Middle English
ME
yonge
“young”
Early Modern English
English
young + -ster
“a young person; originally a younger one”
Modern English
English
youngster
“a young person, especially a child or adolescent”