c.1300, "a boy, a youth" (early 13c. as a surname), from Old French garçun "menial, servant-boy, page; man of base condition," ["in jocular use, 'lad'" - OED]; objective case of gars (11c.; Modern French garçon "boy, bachelor, single man; waiter, porter"). This comes, perhaps via Gallo-Romance, from Frankish *wrakjo- or another Germanic source, from Proto-Germanic *wrakjon (cognates: Old High German recko, Old Saxon wrekkio "a banished person, exile;" English wretch). From c.1400 as "young male servant, squire, page." Meaning "a waiter" (especially one in a French restaurant) is a reborrowing from 1788.