▪ I. scaum, n. Sc. and dial.
(skɑm)
Also scam, scame, skaum.
[Belongs to scaum v.]
1. A burn or scorch; ‘the act of singeing clothes by putting them too near the fire, or by means of a hot iron’ (Jam.); also, a mark of burning.
| 1813 Picken Poems I. 132 (Jam.) But ay whan Satan blaws the coal, I find it's best the scaum to thole. 1874 G. Macdonald Malcolm II. xix. 260 To hide a scaum she had taen for a' her pride. |
2. A thin haze or mist; a light, misty vapour.
| 1824 Mactaggart Gallovid. Encycl. 421 There is red scaum, white scaum, and many others. By the colour or hue of the scaum do Watherwiseakers guess about coming weather. 1825 Jamieson, Scaum o' the sky. 1877 J. Veitch Hist. & Poet. Sc. Border xii. 426 A wide-spreading web of greyish cloud, the skaum of the sky. |
▪ II. scaum, v. Sc. and dial.
(skɑm)
Also scam(e, skaum.
[Of obscure origin.]
1. trans. To burn slightly, scorch, char. Also, ‘to bespatter’ (Brockett N.C. Gloss., ed. 2, 1829).
| a 1670 Spalding Troub. Chas. I (Bannatyne Club) II. 247 Ane fyrie cros of tymber, quhairof everie point of the cros was scamit and brynt with fyre. 1808 Jamieson App., To Scam, to scorch. 1825 ― To Scaum, Scame, v.a. to burn slightly; to singe. 1841 W. Aitken Poet. Wks. 53 Some had their claes tied in a clout To keep them frae be'n scaumed. 1882 Pall Mall G. 26 July 4/2 Then comes a bitter March wind, with snow and sleet, which ‘scam’ the soft plants, and leave them withered as if they had been touched by fire. |
2. ‘To envelope in a mist or haze, to shade’ (E.D.D.).
| 1871 P. H. Waddell Ps. lxxx. 10 The heights they were scaumed wi' her shadow. |