scortum

From Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- (“to cut”). Compare scrōtum, scrautum, scrūta. See also corium, Proto-Germanic *skeraną (whence English shear), Ancient Greek κείρω (keírō, “I cut off”), Albanian harr (“to cut, to mow”), Lithuanian skìrti (“separate”), Welsh ysgar (“separate”), Old Armenian քերեմ (kʻerem, “to scrape, scratch”). The prostitute sense may have arisen from the former skin, leather sense through scortum subigere ("beat leather; tan leather"), as an ancient metaphor for sexual intercourse. According to Festus, Scorta appellantur meretrices, quia ut pelliculae subiguntur 'prostitutes are called "leathers" because they are beaten/tanned like small skins'. Cf. Latin pellicula ("small skin", and "whore" in farce), Spanish pelleja ("skin, hide; whore"). Hammarström observes that skin removed from the animal is loose, flexible and lacks hold.

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈskor.tum/, [ˈs̠kɔrt̪ʊ̃ˑ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈskor.tum/, [ˈskɔrt̪um]

scortum n (genitive scortī); second declension

1. a skin, hide
2. a harlot, prostitute

Second-declension noun (neuter).

• (prostitute): apodix f (Mediaeval), meretrīx f (slang)

• scorteus
• scortillum
• scortor

• scortātor
• scortātus
• scortea

• “scortum”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “scortum”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• scortum in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• scortum in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• James N. Adams (1983), Words for 'prostitute' in Latin, Rheinisches Museum für Philologie, Neue Folge, 126(3/4), pp. 321-358.
• M. Hammarström (1925), De uocibus scorti, scrattae, strittabillae, Éranos 23, pp. 104 ff.