Schinken

Etymology

From Middle High German schinke, from Old High German scinco, from Proto-West Germanic *skinkō, from Proto-Germanic *skinkô, *skinkō (“shank; thigh”). In the sense “tome” originally student slang (18th c.), from the use of pigskin leather to bind such books.

Related to German Low German Schinken (also: skinken, sschinken (Westphalian; linguistic spelling; accusative)) Middle Dutch schenke (“shin, hough, ham”), Middle English schench (“thigh; leg”), dialectal English skink (“a shin of beef”), also English shank (“lower part of the leg”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃɪŋkən/, [ˈʃɪŋkŋ̩]

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• Hyphenation: Schin‧ken

Noun

Schinken m (strong, genitive Schinkens, plural Schinken)

1. ham, pork from the hindquarter
   • 1803, Neues Kochbuch für bürgerliche Haushaltungen, oder Anweisung zur Zubereitung einer gesunden und schmackhaften Hausmannskost, [...], Coburg, page 62:

     Einen Schinken gut zu backen. […] wällt ihn nach der Form des Schinken aus, […] Wenn der der Schinken abgetrocknet ist, […]

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

2. (colloquial) hams, buttocks

   Synonym: Oberschenkel

3. (colloquial, often derogatory) old tome or painting

   Ölschinken ― (large) oil painting

Further reading

• “Schinken” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache
• “Schinken” in Uni Leipzig: Wortschatz-Lexikon
• “Schinken” in Duden online
• “Schinken” in Deutsches Wörterbuch von Jacob und Wilhelm Grimm, 16 vols., Leipzig 1854–1961.
• Schinken on the German Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^de
• Friedrich Kluge (1883) “Schinken”, in John Francis Davis, transl., Etymological Dictionary of the German Language, published 1891