Scragge

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A very thin, bony and scrawny person or animal with little flesh on its frame
2. Someone or something unusually lean and gaunt, with a bony, underfed appearance
3. A skinny, scraggy figure, especially a person or creature that looks undernourished and bony

Etymology: Scragge describes someone so thin they look all bone, and it belongs to a family of words built on the idea of something bony and rough. The base word, "scrag," originally named a lean, scrawny animal, and it also came to mean the neck, the part of the body where the bones and sinews stand out. Its ultimate origin is uncertain, and it is not confidently linked to any particular language. The same sense of roughness runs through "scraggy," meaning lean, bony, or ragged, which is formed from "scrag" with the common adjective ending "-y." "Scrag" has also been used as slang for wringing or breaking someone's neck, which keeps the neck-related sense alive in a more violent direction.

Synonyms: scrag