Veal is the French member of the calf-and-veal pair, matching cow and beef, pig and pork, sheep and mutton. English took it in the early 1300s from Anglo-French vel, from Old French veel, "a calf," from Latin vitellus, "little calf," a diminutive of vitulus.
The Latin word may originally have meant "yearling," if it is related — as some think — to Sanskrit vatsah, "calf," literally a yearling, and to Old English weðer, which survives as wether, a castrated ram. On that account the word for a young animal was originally a word about its age. The same root may lie behind veteran, from Latin vetus, "old," which would make veal and veteran distant relations, one naming the animal at the start of its life and the other the man at the end of his service.
veal (n.) early 14c., vel , "calf meat as food," from Anglo-French vel , veal , Old French veel "a calf" (12c., Modern French veau ), earlier vedel , from Latin vitellus "little calf," diminutive of vitulus "calf," which is perhaps originally "yearling," if it is related, as some think, to Sanskrit vatsah "calf," literally "yearling;" Gothic wiþrus , Old English weðer (see wether ; also compare veteran ). also from early 14c.