Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An awkward and stupid person; an oaf.
  • intransitive verb To bow or curtsy.
  • intransitive verb To bend or stoop.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To bend, stoop, or crouch; bow; courtesy; make humble obeisance.
  • To lie quiet; lurk. See lote.
  • To loiter, tarry, or stay. Hearne.
  • To bow down; abase.
  • To milk, as a cow.
  • noun An awkward, ungainly fellow; a clown.
  • To treat as a lout; flout.
  • To low or bellow.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • intransitive verb Archaic To bend; to box; to stoop.
  • noun A clownish, awkward fellow; a bumpkin.
  • transitive verb obsolete To treat as a lout or fool; to neglect; to disappoint.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Troublemaker, often violent.
  • noun A clownish, awkward fellow; a bumpkin.
  • noun A rude violent man, yob.
  • verb obsolete, transitive To treat as a lout or fool; to neglect; to disappoint.
  • verb intransitive, archaic To bend, bow, stoop.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun an awkward stupid person

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Possibly from lout.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English louten, from Old English lūtan.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Of dialectal origin, compare Middle English louten "to bow, bend low, stoop over" from Old English lūtan from Proto-Germanic *leut-. Cognate with Old Norse lútr ("stooping"), Gothic 𐌻𐌿𐍄𐌾𐌽 (luton, "to deceive"). Non-Germanic cognates are probably Old Church Slavonic лоудити (luditi, "to deceive"), Serbo-Croatian луд (lud) and Albanian lut ("to beg, pray").

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Old English lūtan, from Germanic. Cognate with Old Norse lúta, Danish lude ("to bend"), Norwegian lute ("stoop"), Swedish luta.

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Examples

  • Ignorant, callous, self-centered, incapable of self-improvement lout is more like it.

    Think Progress » Katrina Speech: Bush Pledges to Learn Lessons All Over Again 2005

  • Then her cheeks became red with anger as she remembered that her Tom had been called a lout — a stupid lout.

    Ayala's Angel 2004

  • Then her cheeks became red with anger as she remembered that her Tom had been called a lout -- a stupid lout.

    Ayala's Angel 1993

  • Then her cheeks became red with anger as she remembered that her Tom had been called a lout -- a stupid lout.

    Ayala's Angel 1881

  • Then her cheeks became red with anger as she remembered that her Tom had been called a lout -- a stupid lout.

    Ayala's Angel 1881

  • The talk show host, well-known left-leaning journalist Gad Lerner, invited Berlusconi to tone down his comments and at one point called him a "lout" when Berlusconi made a swipe against the female guests on the show.

    WATCH: Berlusconi Phones Into TV Show To Call It A Brothel AP/The Huffington Post 2011

  • From this there grew up within her mind a certain respect for the "lout", which, however, made him more disagreeable to her than he might have been had he been less persistent.

    Ayala's Angel 1993

  • Before the day was over Lady Tringle spoke to her son, and was astonished to find that the "lout" was quite in earnest -- so much in earnest that he declared his purpose of marrying his cousin in opposition to his father and mother, in opposition even to Ayala herself.

    Ayala's Angel 1993

  • From this there grew up within her mind a certain respect for the "lout", which, however, made him more disagreeable to her than he might have been had he been less persistent.

    Ayala's Angel 1881

  • Before the day was over Lady Tringle spoke to her son, and was astonished to find that the "lout" was quite in earnest -- so much in earnest that he declared his purpose of marrying his cousin in opposition to his father and mother, in opposition even to Ayala herself.

    Ayala's Angel 1881

Comments

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  • Lout under NO SMOKING triangle smokes.

    - Peter Reading, Clues, from Fiction, 1979

    June 26, 2008