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Origin and history of skirt

skirt(n.)

early 14c. (mid-13c. as a surname), "lower part of a woman's dress," the part that hangs from the waist, from Old Norse skyrta "shirt, a kind of kirtle;" see shirt, which is from the Old English cognate, and from which it is not always distinguishable in early use.

The sense development from "shirt" to "skirt" is obscure; it could be from the long shirts of peasant garb (compare Low German cognate Schört, in some dialects "woman's gown").

Also "lower part of a man's gown, clerical vestment, etc." (late 14c.). The sense of "border, edge, part of anything furthest from the mass or the center" (in outskirt, etc.) is recorded by late 15c.

Metonymic use for "women collectively" is from 1550s; the slang sense of "young woman" is from 1906; skirt-chasing "actions taken in romantic or sexual pursuit of females" is attested by 1899.

also from early 14c.

skirt(v.)

c. 1600, "to border, form the edge of," from skirt (n.). The meaning "to pass along the edge" is from 1620s. Related: Skirted; skirting.

also from c. 1600

Entries linking to skirt

outskirt(n.)

"outer border, section or part that 'skirts' along the edge or boundary," 1590s, from out- + skirt (n.) in its secondary sense of "border, boundary, outlying part" (late 15c.; in plural form skirts by 1570s). Now only in the plural, outskirts; originally in Spenser, and singular.

shirt(n.)

Middle English shirt, shirte, "garment for the upper body worn next to the skin," from Old English scyrte, from Proto-Germanic *skurtjon "a short garment" (source also of Old Norse skyrta, Swedish skjorta "skirt, kirtle;" Middle Dutch scorte, Dutch schort "apron;" Middle Low German schörte, Middle High German schurz, German Schurz "apron"), which is perhaps related to Old English scort, sceort "short," etc., from PIE root *sker- (1) "to cut," on the notion of "a cut piece."

OED notes that "the meaning of the word in OE. is obscure, as the only instance of its occurrence is a gloss in which the meaning of the Latin word was probably not understood." Lithuanian šarkas "shirt," Old Church Slavonic sraka "tunic," Russian soročka, Finnish sarkki "shirt" perhaps are from Germanic.

Formerly of the chief under-garment worn by both men and women, but in modern use it has long been only that for men; in reference to women's tops, the word was reintroduced 1896.

Bloody shirt, a blood-stained shirt exposed as a symbol of some outrage, to arouse indignation or resentment, is attested from 1580s, usually figurative. Shirt since late 14c. often has been figurative of one's goods or possessions, hence give (someone) the shirt off one's back (1771); lose one's shirt "suffer total financial loss" (1935). To keep one's shirt on "be patient" (1904) is from the notion of (not) stripping down for a fight.