Etymology
1. 1553, originally "to turn up one's nose, sneer at," then "to rap or flick, as with the fingers" (1563). The noun is first attested 1549, with the meaning "stroke of wit." It's possible that the original word was imitative, along the lines of
flip (v.), but there seems to be some influence from
flit, such as in the
flirt sense of "to move in short, quick flights," attested from 1583. Meanwhile
flirt had come to mean "a pert young hussey" [Johnson] by 1562, and Shakespeare has
flirt-gill (i.e.
Jill) "a woman of light or loose behavior," while
flirtgig was a 17c. Yorkshire dialect word for "a giddy, flighty girl." All or any of these could have fed into the main modern verbal sense of "play at courtship" (1777), which also could have grown naturally from the earlier meaning "to flit inconstantly from object to object" (1578), perhaps influenced by O.Fr.
fleureter "talk sweet nonsense," also "to touch a thing in passing," dim. of
fleur "flower" and metaphoric of bees skimming from flower to flower. The noun meaning "person who flirts" is from 1732. The Eng. word also is possibly related to E.Fris.
flirt "a flick or light blow," and
flirtje "a giddy girl."
2. 1553, from the merger of Early Modern English flirt (“to flick”), flurt (“to mock, jibe, scorn”), and flirt, flurt (“a giddy girl”). Of obscure origin and relation. Apparently related to similar words in Germanic, all of apparently onomatopoeic origin, compare Low German flirt (“a flick of the fingers, a light blow”), Low German flirtje (“a giddy girl”), Low German flirtje (“a flirt”), German Flittchen (“a flirt; tart; hussy”), Norwegian flira (“to giggle, titter”). Compare also Early Modern English jillflirt, gillian flirt, and flirt-gill (“a flirt”), and Scots flird (“a trifling", also, "to jibe, jeer at, talk idly, flirt, flaunt”), which is perhaps from Middle English flerd (“mockery, fraud, deception”), from Old English fleard (“nonsense, vanity, folly, deception”); potentially related to Icelandic flærð (“trickiness, deceit”), Swedish flärd (“vanity, frivolity, flamboyance”), Dutch flard (“tatter, shred”). See flird. See: German, old spelling '
Flittchen', English '
jillflirt'.
Verbs referencing "flirt"
Dutch
flirten, German, old spelling
flirten, French
flirter, Spanish
flirtear, Italian
flirtare, Albanian
flirtoj, Norwegian
flørte, Swedish
flörta.