1540s, "lean person or animal, a raw-bones;" perhaps from a Scandinavian source (compare Norwegian skragg "a lean person;" dialectal Swedish skraka "a great, dry tree; a long, lean man," skragge "old and torn thing," Danish skrog "hull of a ship, carcass," Icelandic skr?ggr, a nickname of the fox); perhaps from root of shrink.