1744, from French glacier (16c.), from Savoy dialect glacière "moving mass of ice," from Old French glace "ice," from Vulgar Latin *glacia (source also of Old Provençal glassa, Italian ghiaccia), from Latin glacies "ice," probably from a suffixed form of PIE root *gel- "cold; to freeze." The German Swiss form gletscher also was used in English (1764).
