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Added 7 October 2026

skin

/skɪn/ noun

In Latin: cutis Wiktionary

noun Definition from WordNet 3.1, Princeton University. Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about skin at Wordnik → Where our words come from →

A natural protective body covering and site of the sense of touch.
your skin is the largest organ of your body
An outer surface (usually thin).
the skin of an airplane
Body covering of a living animal.

verb

Climb awkwardly, as if by scrambling.
Bruise, cut, or injure the skin or the surface of.
The boy skinned his knee when he fell
Remove the bark of a tree.

Origin

From Middle English skyn, skinn, from Old English scinn, from Old Norse skinn (“animal hide”), from Proto-Germanic *skinþą, from Proto-Indo-European *sken- (“to split off”), nasal variant of *skeh₁i-d- (“to cut”). Partially displaced native Old English hȳd (“skin, hide”), from which derives hide. Cognate with Dutch schinde (“bark”), dialectal German Schinde (“fruit peel”); also Breton skant (“scales”), Old Irish cenn (“covering, shell”), Irish scáin (“to tear, burst”), Latin scindō (“to split, divide”), Sanskrit छिनत्ति (chinátti, “to split”).

From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)

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