English

Noun

knout ‎(plural knouts)

1. A leather scourge (multi-tail whip), in the severe version known as 'great knout' with metal weights on each tongue, notoriously used in imperial Russia.
   • 1980: Spray and then slogging knouts of water hit the windows or lights like snarling disaffected at a mansion of the rich and frivolous. — Anthony Burgess, Earthly Powers
   • 2005: The lieutenant gave him twenty strokes of the knout and stuck him in a cage for a few days till the snow was ankle deep. — James Meek, The People's Act of Love (Canongate 2006, p. 193)

Translations

Verb

knout ‎(third-person singular simple present knouts, present participle knouting, simple past and past participle knouted)

1. To flog or beat with a knout.
   • 1992, Will Self, Cock and Bull:

     Different, isn’t it? It’s called kava, by the way. The Fijians make it by knouting some root or other.

French

Etymology

From Russian кнут ‎(knut), from Old East Slavic кнутъ ‎(knutŭ), from Old Norse knútr ‎(“knot”)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /knut/

Noun

knout m ‎(plural knouts)

1. knout, scourge
2. a flogging administered with such a multiple whip; a condemnation to suffer it