Editing Scop (section)

== ''Scop'', {{lang|goh|scopf}}, and relationship to ''scold''==
While {{lang|non|skop}} became English {{wikt-lang|en|scoff}}, the Old Norse {{lang|non|skald}} lives on in a [[Modern English]] word of a similarly deprecating meaning, {{wikt-lang|en|scold}}.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.etymonline.com/word/scold |title=scold |website=Online Etymology Dictionary }}</ref> There is a homonymous Old High German {{lang|goh|scopf}} meaning "abuse, derision" ([[Old Norse]] {{lang|non|skop}}, meaning "mocking, scolding", whence ''scoff''), a third meaning "tuft of hair", and yet another meaning "barn" (cognate to English ''shop''). They may all derive from a Proto-Germanic {{lang|gem-x-proto|skupa}}.

The association with jesting or mocking was, however, strong in Old High German. There was a {{lang|goh|skopfari}} glossing both {{lang|la|poeta}} and {{lang|la|comicus}} and a {{lang|goh|skopfliod}} glossing {{lang|la|canticum rusticum et ineptum}} and {{lang|la|psalmus plebeius}}. {{lang|goh|Skopfsang}}, on the other hand, is of a higher register, glossing {{lang|la|poema, poesis, tragoedia}}. The words involving jesting are derived from another root, Proto-Indo-European {{lang|ine-x-proto|skeub-}} "push, thrust", related to English ''shove, shuffle'', and the [[Oxford English Dictionary]] favours association of ''{{lang|ags|scop}}'' with that root. The question cannot be decided formally since the Proto-Germanic forms coincided in [[Indo-European ablaut|zero grade]], and by the time of the surviving sources (from the late 8th century), the association with both roots may have influenced the word for several centuries.