Etymograph

English

stot

Stot comes from Old English stott ‘a hack, jade, or worthless horse’.

  1. Old Englishc. 450–1150stott1‘a hack, jade, or worthless horse’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500stot1
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1850stot1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English stot
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1850, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology: “Rory would never have believed that his half-hour had…”.

Earlier history uncertain. See Wiktionary.

Lineage

  1. Old Englishc. 450–1150stottWiktionary, English stot‘a hack, jade, or worthless horse’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500stotWiktionary, English stot
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1850stotWiktionary, English stot. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1850, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology: “Rory would never have believed that his half-hour had…”

The story

From Middle English stot, from Old English stott (‘a hack, jade, or worthless horse’), from Proto-West Germanic *stott, *stutt, of uncertain origin; yet, probably related to Old Norse stútr (‘young bull, steer’) (whence Danish stud (‘a castrated bull, steer’), Swedish stut (‘a steer’)).uncertain The source flags this step as uncertain.

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Every English word from Old English stott

Another origin of stot

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*(s)tewd-‘to push, to hit’uncertain
  2. Proto-Germanicc. 500 BCE–200 CE*stautaną‘to push, jolt, bump’uncertain
  3. Proto-West Germanicc. 200–500 CE*stautan‘to knock, to bump’uncertain
  4. Old Saxonc. 800–1200stōtan‘to shock’uncertain
  5. Middle Dutchc. 1150–1500stoten‘to push’uncertain
  6. Englishtodaystot

Likely derived from Middle Dutch stoten (‘to push’) or Middle Low German stôten, from Old Saxon stōtan, from Proto-West Germanic *stautan, from Proto-Germanic *stautaną (‘to push, jolt, bump’), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)tewd-, from *(s)tew- (‘to push, hit’). Also compare Middle English steten (‘to thrust, strike, push, knock down’), Old Norse stauta and steyta (whence Danish støde), Gothic 𐍃𐍄𐌰𐌿𐍄𐌰𐌽 (stautan), Old Saxon stotan; as well, modern English stutter.

Today it means

noun An inferior horse.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “stot”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.

Etymograph / Old English stott / stot

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