Etymology Dictionary

JILT,  a flirt, inconstant woman.  (L.)   'Where dilatory fortune plays the jilt;' Otway, The Orphan, i. 1. 66.   'And who is jilted for another's sake;' Dryden, tr. of Juvenal, Sat. vi. 530.   A contraction of jillet.   'A jillet brak his heart at last;' Burns, On a Scotch Bard, Gone to the W. Indies, st. 6.   A diminutive (with suffix -et) of Jill, a personal name, but used in the same sense as jilt or flirt.   Hence the compounds flirt-gill, Romeo, ii. 4. 162; and flirt-Gillian, Beaum. and Fletcher, The Chances, iii. 1 (Landlady).   Cf. 'Bagasse, a baggage, queane, jyll, punke, flirt;' Cot.   Gill is short for Juliana; see Gill (4).   Der. jilt, verb.   ➩ The use of jillet for Jill was probably suggested by the similar word giglot or giglet, a wanton woman (Meas. for Meas. v. 352), which is to be connected with O.F. gigues, a gay girl (Roquefort), and with Jig.   The sense of jig may have affected that of jilt.