Etymology Dictionary

HARLOT,  a wanton woman.  (F.)   Orig. used of either sex indifferently; in fact, more commonly of men in Mid. Eng.   It has not, either, a very bad sense, and means little more than 'fellow.'   'He was a gentil harlot and a kind;' Chaucer, C. T. 649.   'A sturdy harlot [a stout fellow] wente hem ay behind;' id. 7336.   'Dauwe the dykere with a dosen harlotes of portours and pykeporses and pylede toth-drawers' = Davy the ditcher with a dozen fellows who were porters and pick-purses and hairless (?) tooth-drawers; P. Plowman, C. vii. 369.   'Begge as on harlot' = beg like a vagabond, Ancren Riwle, p. 356.   Undoubtedly of Romance origin.—O.F. arlot (probably once harlot), explained by Roquefort as 'fripon, coquin, voleur,' a vagabond, a robber; also spelt herlot, for which Diez gives a reference to the Romance of Tristran, i. 173.   β. The Prov. arlot, a vagabond, occurs in a poem of the 13th century; Bartsch, Chrestomathie Provençale, 207. 20.   Florio explains Ital. arlotto by 'a lack-Latin, a hedge-priest,' and arlotta as a harlot in the modern E. sense.    Ducange explains Low Lat. arlotus to mean a glutton.   γ. Of disputed origin, but presumably Teutonic, viz. from the O.H.G. karl, a man.   This is a well-known word, appearing also as Icel. karl, a man, fellow, A.S. ceorl, a man, and in the mod. E. churl; see Churl.   The suffix is the usual F. dimin. suffix -ot, as in bill-ot from bille; see Brachet's Dict. § 281; it also appears in the E. personal name Charlotte, which is probably the very same word.   We actually find the whole word carlot in Shak. As You Like It, iii. 5. 108.   Note also the form Arletta, said to have been the name of the mother of William I.   ¶ We find also W. herlod, a stripling, lad; but this is merely the E. word borrowed; the Cornish not only borrowed the E. harlot unchanged (with the sense of 'rogue'), but also the word harlutry, corruption, which is plainly the M.E. harlotrie, with a suffix (-rie) which is extremely common in French.   See Williams, Cornish Lexicon, p. 211.    Der. harlot-ry = M.E. harlotrie, of which one meaning was 'ribald talk;' see Chaucer, C. T. 563, 3147.   The suffix -ry is of F. origin, as in caval-ry, bribe-ry, &c.