Writing today, I came across the need to use the word “flout.” To be sure I wasn’t making the old “flout-flaunt” mixup that is so common, I checked the dictionary and found that the word “flout” — which means to mock, show contempt for, or blatantly disregard — came from the old Middle English flouten verb, to play the flute. In Middle Dutch, fluyten was a verb that meant both to play the flute and to jeer.
How did the image of someone playing the flute, toot toot toot, come to indicate a highly public, mocking, contemptuous disregard?
I love etymology, not least for its mysteries.
