Sc. and north. [Of obscure origin; perh. in some way belonging to the Teut. root *stut-: *staut- to thrust, push, knock; in Goth. stautan, ON. stauta (Sw. stöda, Da. støde), OS. stôtan (Du. stooten), OHG. stôȥan (G. stossen). Cf. STOIT v.]
1. intr. To rebound, bounce (from, off); to fall or impinge with a bounce (on, against); to jump, start, spring.
1513. Douglas, Æneis, X. vi. 96. Dartis sevin Alsammyn thai kest … Of quham sum dyd, but harm or other deyr, Scot from hys scheild, his hewmet, or hed geyr.
c. 1620. Z. Boyd, Zion’s Flowers (1855), 93. It leapes, it stots, and stayes not.
1821. Galt, Ann. Parish, xxvi. He attempted to fling it at Sambo, the black lad’s head, but it stottit against the wall, and the lid flying open, the whole mustard flew in his own face. Ibid. (1822), Provost, xxxi. The bailie … stotted out of his chair with the spunk of a birslet pea.
1895. Crockett, Men of Moss-Hags, xxiii. The elshin that had stottit on to the floor.
b. fig.
c. 1590. Montgomerie, Misc. P., iii. 36. Sho [Fortune] stottis at strais, syn stumbillis not at stanis.
1616. W. Haig, in J. Russell, Haigs (1881), 158. If God had not made him stot upon some circumstances in that writ given to your Majesty.
2. To move with a jumping or springing step, to bound along; also trans. (causative). Also, to stagger, lurch, move unsteadily.
1801. W. Beattie, Parings (1873), 43 (E.D.D.). Hame we stot through thick and thin.
1824. Miss Ferrier, Inher., lxviii. They stotted along, side by side, but a full yard asunder.
1858. R. S. Surtees, Ask Mamma, xxxviii. 158. Out sprung puss and went stotting and dotting away with one ear back and the other forward.
1901. G. Douglas, House w. Green Shutters, 267. See how the stot stots about the ring.
1903. Union Mag., July, 312/2. McEwan … unable to carry the heavy coffin ‘stotted’ it from step to step down a steep tortuous High Street stair.
Hence Stotting ppl. a. Also Stotter, a ball that bounces or rebounds.
1853. Surtees, Sponge’s Sp. Tour (1893), 311. Bang! went the other barrel, which the hare acknowledged by two or three stotting bounds and an increase of pace.
1896. W. Park, Jr., Game of Golf, 52. They should be good ‘stotters’—that is to say, when dropped on a flagstone or pavement they should rebound with a clear, hard click.
