English
scrimp
Scrimp may come from Scots scrimp ‘meager’.
- Scotsc. 1450–presentscrimp‘meager’uncertain
- Englishearliest quotation 1851same form
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed
Earlier history uncertain.
Lineage
- Scotsc. 1450–presentscrimp‘meager’uncertain
- Englishearliest quotation 1851same form
Earliest quotation: 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick; or: “For, as a general thing, the English merchant-ship scrimps…”
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- ‘to cut off’
short, share, card, across, cancer, cross, shirt, score, circle, circuit, screen, curve, crucial, circus, circulation, skirt, carnival, scare, curb, cancellation, circa, shrine, scar, corona, shear, crest, incarceration, scrutiny, shred, carnage, raffle, circulate, scorpion, carcinoma, corolla, shrewd, shard, carnal, cirque, circulatory, 119 more
through Proto-Germanic *skrimpaną ‘to shrink’
Today it means
noun A pinching miser; a niggard.
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Scots scrimp / scrimp