1610s, "a discourse or treatise on an art or the arts," from Greek tekhnologia "systematic treatment of an art, craft, or technique," originally referring to grammar, from tekhno-, combining form of tekhnē "art, skill, craft in work; method, system, an art, a system or method of making or doing," from PIE *teks-na- "craft" (of weaving or fabricating), from suffixed form of root *teks- "to weave," also "to fabricate." For ending, see -logy.
The meaning "study of mechanical and industrial arts" (Century Dictionary, 1895, gives as example "spinning, metal-working, or brewing") is recorded by 1859. High technology attested from 1964; short form high-tech is from 1972.