let's skedaddle
let's leave
TRANSLATION
skedaddle = abhauen, verschwinden --- GOOGLE INDEX skedaddle: approximately 160,000 Google hits
STATISTICS
IN THE PRESS
By the 1960s it was commonplace for our leading British actors to SKEDADDLE to Hollywood at the first smell of a dollar bill.
(The Guardian)
(The Guardian)
Did you
know?
skedaddle
verb
- to run away quickly
(Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
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ORIGIN
Although skedaddle originally referred to running away in a fright, modern usage typically refers to merely leaving in a hurry. Most etymology experts agree that skedaddle first appeared around the beginning of the American Civil War and was used to describe soldiers and traitors fleeing the battlefield. The exact origin of the word remains a puzzle though.
The English Dialect Dictionary, a late 19th century publication, says that skedaddle stems from a Scottish or Northern English dialect word meaning to spill or scatter, such as milk. This may be from the Scottish word skiddle, meaning to splash water about or spill. Jonathon Green, in the Cassell Dictionary of Slang, suggests this transferred to the US through "the image of blood and corpses being thus spilled and scattered on the battlefield before the flight of a demoralised army."
If skedaddle is not colourful enough, try out these synonymous idioms:
- fly the coop (coop is a place to keep chickens)
- head for the hills (another war-related expression)
- hightail it, turn tail (from animals that raise their tails when fleeing)
- take to the woods
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SYNONYMS
blow, bolt, clear out, dash (off), decamp, fly, leave, make haste, make oneself scarce, make tracks, scamper, scat, split, take off, vamoose
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SMUGGLE OWAD INTO TODAY'S CONVERSATION:
"Let's skedaddle and get to the restaurant before it closes."
verb
- to run away quickly
(Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
---
ORIGIN
Although skedaddle originally referred to running away in a fright, modern usage typically refers to merely leaving in a hurry. Most etymology experts agree that skedaddle first appeared around the beginning of the American Civil War and was used to describe soldiers and traitors fleeing the battlefield. The exact origin of the word remains a puzzle though.
The English Dialect Dictionary, a late 19th century publication, says that skedaddle stems from a Scottish or Northern English dialect word meaning to spill or scatter, such as milk. This may be from the Scottish word skiddle, meaning to splash water about or spill. Jonathon Green, in the Cassell Dictionary of Slang, suggests this transferred to the US through "the image of blood and corpses being thus spilled and scattered on the battlefield before the flight of a demoralised army."
If skedaddle is not colourful enough, try out these synonymous idioms:
- fly the coop (coop is a place to keep chickens)
- head for the hills (another war-related expression)
- hightail it, turn tail (from animals that raise their tails when fleeing)
- take to the woods
---
SYNONYMS
blow, bolt, clear out, dash (off), decamp, fly, leave, make haste, make oneself scarce, make tracks, scamper, scat, split, take off, vamoose
---
SMUGGLE OWAD INTO TODAY'S CONVERSATION:
"Let's skedaddle and get to the restaurant before it closes."
