skittish

English

Etymology

Probably from skite (“to move lightly and hurriedly; to move suddenly, particularly in an oblique direction (Scotland, Northern England)”) +‎ -ish; compare skitter.

Pronunciation
  • IPA(key): /ˈskɪtɪʃ/
  • (T-flapping) IPA(key): [ˈskɪɾɪʃ]
  • Audio (US)(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɪtɪʃ
  • Hyphenation: skit‧tish

Adjective

skittish (comparative more skittish, superlative most skittish)

  1. Easily scared or startled; timid.
    The dog likes people he knows, but he is skittish around strangers.
    • 1557, Roger Edgeworth, Sermons Very Fruitfull, Godly, and Learned, London: Robert Caly, The fiftenth treatice or Sermon,
      All such be like a skittish starting horse, whiche coming ouer a bridge, wil start for a shadowe, or for a stone lying by him, and leapeth ouer on the other side into the water, & drowneth both horse and man.
  2. Wanton; changeable; fickle.
  3. Difficult to manage; tricky.
    • 1871–1872, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter 15, in Middlemarch […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh, London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book (please specify |book=I to VIII):
      For everybody’s family doctor was remarkably clever, and was understood to have immeasurable skill in the management and training of the most skittish or vicious diseases.

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See also
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