A run of characters treated as one value. Also a thread — the older sense the data one is named from.
Old English streng (a cord, a line, a string), from Proto-Germanic *strangi-, from a Proto-Indo-European root *strenk- (tight, taut); a run of characters treated as one value is named for the thread it was before it was data.
A run of characters treated as one value, named for the older thread it descends from. The data type kept the metaphor and let the rope go.