scorch

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English scorchen,^[2][3][4][5] whose origin the OED and Hoad call uncertain.^[6][7] Several dictionaries take it as an alteration of scorcnen (“to make dry, parch; to become singed”),^[3][4][5][2] implied in a past participle in the “Ormulum”, probably about 1200,^[4] which is perhaps borrowed from Old Norse skorpna (“to be shriveled”),^{[3][4][5][8][2]} a verb cognate with Old English scrimman (“to shrink, dry up”) and so with shrimp.^[3][4][5] The OED instead relates it to the earlier synonyms scorken and scorklen and finds the formation obscure.^[6][9] The older derivation from Old French escorchier (“to strip off the skin”), from Vulgar Latin *excorticō (“to flay”) and cortex (“bark”), is rejected by the OED because the flaying verb, which reached Middle English separately in the 15th century, occurs only in a few translations from French.^[6][3][2] Skeat, Weekley and Partridge still gave the French verb a part, as an influence on the form.^[10][9][11] Dictionary.com suggests a blend of the parching verb and torch.^[12]

Earliest recorded meaning

To burn on the surface, to char: before 1325, in a cookery recipe.^[2][4] Etymonline says the early 14th century; the OED's first quotation is later, from Lydgate in 1430.^[3][6]

Semantic evolution

The verb was first about surface burning and drying, as of food and of plants;^[2] Chaucer used it of the wind Notus, with a variant reading scorklith.^[9][13] Like parch and singe, it could also describe the effect of cold, as in Holland's Pliny, "scortched and sendged with snow",^[9] and Wright records cabbages scorched by frost in Berkshire and Hampshire dialect.^[14] Figurative use appears about 1595.^[6] Johnson (1755) separated "to burn superficially" from a plain "to burn",^[15] a sense the OED marks obsolete after 1625.^[6] The noun followed from the verb, as a mark or burn in 1611, in Cotgrave.^[6][4] The sense "to go very fast" arose among cyclists: the noun is recorded from 1885, the verb from 1891,^[6] and Green's Dictionary of Slang has it of cyclists and then of motorists from the 1890s on.^[16] The scorched earth policy, by 1937, is said to translate a Chinese term for tactics against the Japanese advance,^[3] and the OED has to scorch the earth from 1941.^[6]

Timeline

• before 1325 – to burn on the surface, to char.^[2][4] The OED's first quotation is from 1430.^[6]
• c. 1595 – figurative use of the verb.^[6]
• 1611 – noun, a mark made by scorching.^[6][4][3]
• 1885 – noun, a fast run on a cycle.^[6]
• 1891 – verb, to cycle or motor at high speed.^[6]
• 1906 – noun, a scorched look of leaves from plant disease.^[6]
• 1941 – to scorch the earth, of a military policy.^[6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To burn the surface of something so as to change its colour, taste or texture: The iron scorched the sleeve of his shirt.^{[17][5][6][18]}
2. To dry up or wither with heat, or to be dried up in this way: Weeks of drought had scorched the pasture.^{[17][5][18][19]}
3. (informal) To be very hot: By noon the beach was scorching.^[17]
4. To criticize harshly; to attack with censure or sarcasm.^[17][5][18]
5. (slang) To drive or ride very fast.^[17][6][16]
6. To burn an area so that an invading enemy finds no crops or supplies.^[6][19]

Noun

1. A slight burn, or the mark it leaves: a scorch on the tablecloth.^[17][5][6]
2. A browning of leaves or fruit caused by disease, pests or heat.^{[17][5][6][19]}
3. (colloquial) A spell of very fast driving.^{[5][19][6][16]}

Word family

• scorchingly
• leaf scorch
• scorcher
• scorched earth

Related words

• shrimp
• score
• scotch

Usage notes

Merriam-Webster enters a separate dialect verb scorch, chiefly English, "to cut, slash, scratch", as an alteration of score influenced by the burning verb.^[5] The OED and the Shorter Oxford also derive it from that verb, perhaps after scratch, with dates from about 1550 to 1823 in the OED;^[6][19] the Middle English Dictionary suggests a blend with scotch.^[2] Wright records it in Yorkshire, Cheshire, Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire and Shropshire for scratching, rubbing a hearth or step with stones, and blocking a wheel, and quotes the Babees Book, "With knyfe scortche not the Boorde".^[14]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
10. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
12. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
13. ^ Stratmann, Francis Henry (1891), A Middle-English Dictionary, revised by Henry Bradley, Oxford: Clarendon Press
14. ^ a b Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
15. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
16. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
17. ^ a b c d e f g Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
18. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
19. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press