Skin Definition

skĭn

skinned, skinning, skins

noun

skins

The outer covering or integument of the animal body.

Webster's New World

Such a covering, esp. that of a small animal, when removed from the body and prepared for use; pelt.

Webster's New World

Something like skin in appearance or function; any outer layer, as fruit rind, the shell or plating of a ship, a film or scum, the outermost nacreous layer in a pearl, etc.

Webster's New World

A usually thin, closely adhering outer layer.

The skin of a peach; a sausage skin; the skin of an aircraft.

American Heritage

A thin, close-fitting, usually elastic garment, especially a shirt, worn by scuba divers and others who engage in water sports for protection against scrapes and other superficial injuries.

American Heritage

Synonyms:

Synonyms:
peel
cutis
tegument
pelt
hide
pell
peeling
paring
kip
hull
glume
film
exuviae (cast-off-skin)
episperm
peltry

Antonyms:

verb

skinned, skinning, skins

To remove skin from.

Webster's New World

To climb (up or down)

Webster's New World

To bruise, cut, or injure the skin or surface of.

I skinned my knee.

American Heritage Medicine

To cover with or as with skin; grow skin on.

Webster's New World

To strip or peel off, as or like skin.

Webster's New World

Synonyms:

Antonyms:

adjective

Depicting and exploiting nudity and sex.

A skin magazine.

Webster's New World

Synonyms:

idiom

by the skin of (one's) teeth

By the smallest margin.

American Heritage

get under (someone's) skin

To irritate or stimulate; provoke.
To preoccupy someone; become an obsession.

American Heritage

have a thick skin

To be slow to take offense.
To be insensitive to the needs or concerns of others.

American Heritage

make (one's) skin

To cause one to be afraid or disgusted.

American Heritage

under the skin

Beneath the surface; fundamentally:
enemies who are really brothers under the skin.

American Heritage

Other Word Forms of Skin

Noun

Singular:

skin

Plural:

skins

Idioms, Phrasal Verbs Related to Skin

by the skin of (one's) teeth
get under (someone's) skin
have a thick skin
make (one's) skin
under the skin
be no skin off someone's nose
by the skin of one's teeth
get under someone's skin
have a thick (or thin) skin
save someone's skin
skin someone alive
skin and bones

Origin of Skin

From Middle English skinn, from Old Norse skinn (“animal hide"), from Proto-Germanic *skinþą (compare Old English scinn (“hide"), Dutch schinde (“bark"), dialectal German Schinde (“fruit peel")), from Proto-Celtic *skento- (compare Breton skant (“scales"), Old Irish ceinn), from Proto-Indo-European *skend- (“to split off") (compare Irish scainim (“I tear, burst"), Latin scindere (“to split, divide"), Sanskrit [script?] (chinátti, “he splits")[Devanagari?]), nasal variant of *skeh₁i-d- (“to cut"). More at shed.

From Wiktionary
Middle English from Old Norse skinn sek- in Indo-European roots

From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition