different between scum vs surf

English

Alternative forms

• skum (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English scum, scome, skum, skome, scumme, from Middle Dutch sch?me (“foam”), from Proto-Germanic *sk?maz (“froth, foam”), from Proto-Indo-European *skew- (“to cover, conceal”). Cognate with Dutch schuim (“foam”), German Schaum (“foam”), Danish and Swedish skum (“foam”). Compare also French écume (“scum”), Italian schiuma (“foam”), Walloon schome (“scum, foam”), Lithuanian šamas (“catfish”) and skanus (“tasty”) from the same Germanic source. Related to skim.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sk?m/
• Rhymes: -?m

Noun

scum (countable and uncountable, plural scums)

1. (uncountable) A layer of impurities that accumulates at the surface of a liquid (especially molten metal or water).

2. (uncountable) A greenish water vegetation (such as algae), usually found floating on the surface of ponds

3. The topmost liquid layer of a cesspool or septic tank.
4. (uncountable, slang, chiefly US) semen
5. (derogatory, slang) A reprehensible person or persons.

Synonyms

• (layer of impurities): dross, impurities
• (layer of impurities on molten metal): cinder, scoriae, slag
• (person considered reprehensible): bastard

Derived terms

• scumbag
• scummy
• scum of the earth

Translations

Verb

scum (third-person singular simple present scums, present participle scumming, simple past and past participle scummed)

1. To remove the layer of scum from (a liquid etc.).
2. To remove (something) as scum.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, II.vii:

     Some scumd the drosse, that from the metall came; / Some stird the molten owre with ladles great […].

3. To become covered with scum.
   • 1769, Elizabeth Raffald, The Experienced English House-keeper, pp.321-322:

     Take the smallest Cucumbers you can get, and as free from Spots as possible, put them into a strong Salt and Water for nine or ten Days, or 'till they are quite Yellow, and stir them twice a Day at least, or they will scum over, and grow soft

4. (obsolete) To scour (the land, sea etc.).
5. (obsolete) To gather together, as scum.
   • 1815, Rudolf Ackerman and Frederic Shoberl, The Repository of Arts, Literature, Commerce, Manufactures, Fashions and Politics:

     A great majority of the members are scummed together from the Jacobinical dregs of former periods of the revolution.

6. (video games, informal) To startscum or savescum.

Translations

Anagrams

• CMUs, MCUs, USMC, cums

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /s??f/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /s?f/
• Rhymes: -??(?)f
• Homophone: serf (in accents with the fern-fir-fur merger)

Etymology

1680s, perhaps from earlier suffe (c. 1590). Unknown, possibly related to sough, or possibly of Indo-Aryan origin, as the word was formerly a reference to the coast of India.The verb is from 1917.

Noun

surf (countable and uncountable, plural surfs)

1. Waves that break on an ocean shoreline.
   • 1883, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island

     […] perhaps it was the look of the island, with its gray, melancholy woods, and wild stone spires, and the surf that we could both see and hear foaming and thundering on the steep beach […]

   • 1898, J. Meade Falkner, Moonfleet Chapter 5

     'But when the surf fell enough for the boats to get ashore, and Greening held a lantern for me to jump down into the passage, after we had got the side out of the tomb, the first thing the light fell on at the bottom was a white face turned skyward.
2. An instance or session of riding a surfboard in the surf.

3. (Britain, dialect) The bottom of a drain.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

surf (third-person singular simple present surfs, present participle surfing, simple past and past participle surfed)

1. To ride a wave, usually on a surfboard.
2. (transitive, intransitive) To browse the Internet, television, etc.

Translations

Derived terms

• surfer (noun)

Derived terms

• (ride a wave): surfer, surfing, surfboard; crowdsurf, train-surf
• (browse the Internet): channel-surf, counter surf, cybersurf, netsurf, silver surfer

Anagrams

• Furs, furs

French

Noun

surf m (uncountable)

1. surfing

Derived terms

• surf des neiges

Related terms

• surfer
• surfeur
• surfeuse

Italian

Etymology

From English surf.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?su?f/, IPA^(key): /s??f/
• Hyphenation: sùrf

Noun

surf m (invariable)

1. (sports) surfing

Derived terms

• surfista
• surfare
• tavola da surf
• windsurf

Spanish

Etymology

From English surf.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?su?f/, [?su?f]

• IPA^(key): /?so?f/, [?so?f]

Noun

surf m (uncountable)

1. surfing

Derived terms