rout

The noun is derived from Middle English rout, route (“group of people associated with one another, company; entourage, retinue; army; group of soldiers; group of pirates; large number of people, crowd; throng; group of disreputable people, mob; riot; group of animals; group of objects; proper condition or manner”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman route, rute, Middle French rote, route, Old French rote, route, rute (“group of people, company; group of armed people; group of criminals; group of cattle”) (modern French route (obsolete)), from Latin rupta (compare Late Latin ruta, rutta (“group of marauders; riot; unlawful assembly”)), the feminine of ruptus (“broken; burst, ruptured”), the perfect passive participle of rumpō (“to break, burst, rupture, tear; to force open; (figurative) to annul; to destroy; to interrupt”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *Hrewp- (“to break; to tear (up)”). The English word is a doublet of route.

The noun is derived from Middle French route (“military defeat; retreat”), from rout, archaic past participle of Middle French, Old French rompre (“to break; to break up, disperse”) (modern French rompre (“to break, snap; to break up (with someone)”)), from Latin rumpere, the present active infinitive of rumpō (“to break, burst, rupture, tear; to force open; (figurative) to annul; to destroy; to interrupt”); see further at etymology 1.

The verb is derived from Middle English routen (“to snore; to grunt, snort; to sleep; to dwell; to settle permanently”), [and other forms], from Old English hrūtan (“to snore; to make a noise”), from Proto-West Germanic *hrūtan (“to snore”), from Proto-Germanic *hrūtaną, *hreutaną (“to snore”), from *hruttōną (“to snore; to roar”), from Proto-Indo-European *ker-, *kor-, *kr- (“to croak, crow”), *krut- (“to snore; to roar”), probably ultimately imitative.

A variant of wrout, itself a variant of wroot (“to search or root in the ground”) (obsolete), from Middle English wroten (“to search or root in the ground; of a person: to dig earth; of a worm: to slither, wriggle; to corrode; of a worm: to irritate by biting the skin; to destroy (a fortification) by digging or mining”) [and other forms] (whence root), from Old English wrōtan (“to root up or rummage with the snout”). from Proto-West Germanic *wrōtan, from Proto-Germanic *wrōtaną (“to dig with the nose or snout, to root”); further etymology uncertain, perhaps related to Proto-Indo-European *wréh₂ds (“a root”), whence the English nouns wort and root.

Possibly a variant of root (“to dig or pull out by the roots; to abolish, exterminate, root out”), from Middle English wroten; see further at etymology 5. Some recent uses are difficult to tell apart from rout (“of an animal, especially a pig: to search (for something) in the ground with the snout; to search for and find (something)”).

Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0 · source