"S" Word Origins

skol

Origin

Borrowed from Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish skål.

skronk

Origin

Imitative.

skulduggery

Origin

An alteration of Scots sculduddery, sculdudrie (“adultery, unchaste behaviour; obscenity, lewdness”), of long-uncertain origin (probably a euphemism). Relation to skull is speculative at best and likely folk etymology. The American spelling skullduggery is in keeping with terms such as skillful and willful.

skulk

Origin

From Middle English sculke, skulke, skulken, of North Germanic origin; compare Danish skulke (“shirk”), Swedish skolka (“play truant”).

skull

Middle English

From Middle English sculle, likely from a dialect form of Old Norse skalli ("bald head, skull").

skully

Origin

From skull + -y; (game): from the skulls which are drawn around the center square in the game.

skunk

Origin

Borrowed from an Algonquian language of southern New England, from a word meaning roughly "he who urinates/squirts", referring to the animal's spray.

skutterudite

Origin

From Norwegian Skutterud + -ite, after the old spelling of the town of Skotterud in Norway.

sky

Old Norse

From Old Norse ský ("cloud"), which gradually replaced the older English word heofon in everyday use — heofon survives today as "heaven".

skyclad

Origin

From sky + clad, indicating that the person in question is clad only in the sky. Attested from early 20th century England, it is partially a calque of Sanskrit दिगम्बर (digambara, “having all (=ten) quarters of the globe as one's only clothing, i.e., naked”).

skydiver

Origin

From skydive + -er or sky + diver.

Skye

Scottish Gaelic

Derived from Scottish Gaelic An t-Eilean Sgitheanach, of long disputed (probably non-Indo-European substrate) origin, with several theories proposed and none widely accepted; see Etymology of Skye.

skyla

Origin

20th-century invention, shortened from Skyler.

Skylar

Origin

Pronunciation spelling of Schuyler used since the 1980s.

skylark

Origin · 1809

From "sky" plus "lark" (the bird); the verb sense arose around 1809 among sailors, possibly influenced by a northern English dialect word for "to play".

Skyler

Dutch

From Dutch schuyler, "scholar, shelter."

skylight

Origin

From sky + light.

skyline

Origin

From sky + line.

Skynet

Origin

sky + net. From sky and network. The first satellite, Skynet 1A, was launched on 22 November 1969.

skype

Origin · 2003

From the brand name Skype, a video-calling and messaging app launched in 2003; the name itself is thought to derive from "sky peer-to-peer."

skyrocket

Origin

A compound of "sky" and "rocket", originally naming the firework before the verb sense of "shooting up suddenly" developed.

skyscraper

Origin · 1880

A compound of "sky" and "scraper", first used for tall steel-framed buildings in American cities like New York and Chicago during the 1880s.

skywalker

Origin

From "sky" plus "walker"; historically associated with Mohawk ironworkers famous for working fearlessly on high steel beams in New York City.

skyway

Origin

From sky + way.

slab

Middle English

From Middle English sclabbe, of uncertain origin, possibly related to older words for a slippery or smooth piece of timber.

slabber

Origin

From Middle English slaberen, from Middle Dutch slabberen (“to lap, sup, slaver, slabber”), from Old Dutch *slabron, from Proto-West Germanic *slabrōn, from Proto-Germanic *slabrōną (“to scrawl, make a mess”), ultimately imitative. Cognate with Low German slabbern (“to slabber”), German schlabbern (“to slabber”), Icelandic slafra (“to slaver”). More at slaver.

slabbery

Origin

From slabber + -y.

slabby

Origin

From slab (“mud, sludge”) + -y.

slack

Old English

From Old English slæc ("slack, lazy"), from a Proto-Germanic root meaning loose or slow.

slacken

Origin

From Middle English slakenen, equivalent to slack + -en.

slacker

Origin

From "slack" plus the suffix -er, related to the phrase "slack off".

slackline

Origin

From slack + line. The verb is a back-formation from slacklining.

slackness

Origin

From Middle English slacnesse, slakenes, slaknesse; equivalent to slack + -ness. Compare Old English slæcnes.

slade

Old English

From Old English slæd ("valley, glade"), a word still surviving mainly in English place names and older rural vocabulary.

slag

Germanic

Borrowed from Middle Low German slagge, related to a Germanic root for "to strike" — originally referring to metal splinters knocked off during hammering.

slake

Origin

From Middle English slaken (“to render slack, to slake”), from Old English sleacian, from Old English slæc (“slack”). Unrelated to, but possibly influenced by, the Old Norse sløkkva (“to extinguish”), compare Swedish släcka in the phrase släcka sin törst (“quench one's thirst”), släcka elden (“put out the fire”), and släckt kalk (“slaked lime”).

slam

Middle English

From an unrecorded Middle English word likely borrowed from Old Norse slæma ("to strike, swing a weapon"), related to Scandinavian words for banging or clattering.

slammer

Origin

From slam plus the agent suffix -er — literally "something that gets slammed."

slander

Old French

From Old French esclandre, ultimately from Greek skandalon ("stumbling block"), the same root that gives us "scandal."

slanderous

Origin

From slander plus -ous, "full of."

slang

Origin · 1756

First recorded around 1756 meaning the special vocabulary of tramps or thieves; its deeper origin is uncertain, though it may come from a Scandinavian source related to words meaning "to sling" or "to fling."

slant

Middle English

From late Middle English, related to a dialect word "slent," probably from Old Norse; likely influenced by the word "aslant."

slap

Middle English

From Middle English slappen, probably imitative of the sound itself.

slapdash

Origin

From slap + dash. First attested in the late 17th century, meaning "careless".

slapper

Yiddish

From slap plus -er; the derogatory sense may derive from Yiddish "schlepper," meaning a slovenly person.

slappy

Origin

From slap plus -y.

slapstick

English

From the slap stick, the hinged double board used in commedia dell'arte and pantomime to make a loud slapping noise; the name of the prop transferred to the style of comedy it accompanied.

slapstick comedy

English

From the slapstick, a stage prop made of two thin boards hinged so that striking someone produced a loud crack with almost no force, allowing pretend beatings to sound violent and look painless.