Knout
//naʊt// noun, verb
noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 A leather scourge (multi-tail whip), in the severe version known as 'great knout' with metal weights on each tongue, notoriously used in imperial Russia.
"In Moscow, a Court carbonadoes / His ignorant serfs with the knout; / […] / But Eton has crueller terrors / Than these,—in the Windsor Express."
- 2 a whip with a lash of leather thongs twisted with wire; used for flogging prisoners wordnet
Verb
- 1 To flog or beat with a knout.
"Different, isn’t it? It’s called kava, by the way. The Fijians make it by knouting some root or other."
Example
More examples"In Moscow, a Court carbonadoes / His ignorant serfs with the knout; / […] / But Eton has crueller terrors / Than these,—in the Windsor Express."
Etymology
Via French knout from Russian кнут (knut), from Old East Slavic кнутъ (knutŭ), from Old Norse knútr (“knot in a cord”). Doublet of knot, node, and nodus.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.