v. (wk)
WA pres. pl. schoutis
'raise a loud cry, insult with shouts'
(Modern English shouted)The instance at Pe 877 is the earliest known attestation of the common MnE v. shout. It is usually derived from the n. schout (OED's shout n.2, MED's shout(e n.1), which appears around the same time (Cl 840) and is most plausibly connected to the OIcel n. skúta 'a taunt' (which occurs only in NGmc, and is probably ult. related to the root of the common PGmc *skeutan- 'to shoot'). The difficulty with this theory is in explaining the preponderance of spellings representing /ʃ/, which would have had to be substituted for /sk/. As Bj. notes, however, it may be 'a doublet form' to the more securely Norse-derived MnE v. scout 'to mock, reject with scorn' (OED also compares the OIcel compound skútyrði 'taunts, reproaches'). While the phoentic evidence is inconclusive, the late appearance of both the v. and n. in English might be another point against postulating a native etymon.
PGmc Ancestor
*skūt-
Proposed ON Etymon (OIcel representative)
skúta 'a taunt'
(ONP skúta (2) (sb.))
Other Scandinavian Reflexes
OE Cognate
Phonological and morphological markers
Summary category
B1
Both the v. and n. are first attested from the Gaw MS and MED's citations include a high proportion of N texts, but also more widespread occurrences, incl. Chaucer and Lydgate.
Occurrences in the Gersum Corpus
Pe 877; WA 929
Skeat read <schoutid> (altered from <schoutis) at WA 580 and emended to *schontid, which TPD gives as the original reading.