clout
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /klaʊt/
ipa: /klaʊt/
note: Canadian raising
ipa: [klʌʊt]
ipa: /klæɔt/
ipa: /klæʊt/
rhymes: -aʊt
Forms: form: clouts
Etymology: From Middle English clout (“piece of cloth”), from Old English clūt, from Proto-Germanic *klūtaz, from Proto-Indo-European *gelewdos, from Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to ball up, amass”). The influence sense originated in the dialect of Chicago, but has become widespread.
Cognate with Old Norse klútr (“kerchief”), Swedish klut, Danish klud, Middle High German klōz (“lump”), whence German Kloß, and dialectal Russian глуда (gluda). See also cleat.
Senses: examples: text: Having relinquished his clout in City Council to run for a place on the county board, and having lost stature by reason of his failure to win the presidency, Duffy was in no position to seek the party chairmanship for himself
ref: 1975, Len O'Connor, Clout--Mayor Daley and His City, page 74:
text: […]ethics officers themselves often complain that they can recommend but have little clout with which to create real change.
ref: 1986, Tony Alessandra, The New Art of Managing People, page 76:
text: The chopped mushrooms add depth to both the Waitrose and the Go-Go Vegan recipe, but what gives the latter some real clout on the flavour front is a teaspoon of Marmite.
ref: 2011 December 15, Felicity Cloake, “How to cook the perfect nut roast”, in Guardian:
text: It's funny how they judge you when they see you made a change / I poured another four just to take away the pain / My friends weren't my friends, they was ^([sic]) looking for some clout / I had what they wanted so they always came around
ref: 2017, Kimetrius Foose (Lil Skies), Myron Goedhart, “Fake”, performed by Lil Skies:
text: Rowan, like most teenagers on the internet, wasn’t after fame or money, though he made a decent amount — at one point $10,000 a month and more, he said. What Rowan wanted was clout. On the internet, clout is a social currency that can be used to obtain just about anything. Rack up enough while you’re young, and doors everywhere begin to open.
ref: 2019 November 29, Taylor Lorenz, “Here’s What’s Happening in the American Teenage Bedroom”, in New York Times:
text: I'm that girl all alone in the crowd / 'Cause all of you's are followers and do it for the clout
ref: 2025, “Young”, performed by Little Simz:
glosses: Influence or effectiveness, especially political.
examples: text: ‘Such a clout on the ear as you gave me… But I soon taught you.’
ref: 1910, Katherine Mansfield, Frau Brenchenmacher Attends A Wedding:
text: One of her goons gave him a clout on the ear.
ref: 1985, Brian Daley, Jinx on a Terran Inheritance, page 338:
glosses: A blow with the hand.
examples: text: '... allowed Boston to score all of its runs on homers, including a pair of clouts by Jacoby Ellsbury ...'
ref: 2011 August 17, Michael Vega, “Triple double”, in The Boston Globe, page C1:
topics: ball-games
baseball
games
hobbies
lifestyle
sports
glosses: A home run.
examples: text: For kings are clouts that euery man ſhoots at,
Our Crowne the pin that thouſands ſeeke to cleaue.
ref: c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire; London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act II, scene iv:
text: A’ must shoot nearer or he’ll ne’er hit the clout.
ref: c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]:
topics: archery
government
hobbies
lifestyle
martial-arts
military
politics
sports
war
glosses: The center of the butt at which archers shoot; probably once a piece of white cloth or a nail head.
examples: text: When a new-hatched savage running wild about his native woodlands in a grass clout, followed by the nibbling goats, as if he were a green sapling; even then, in Queequeg’s ambitious soul, lurked a strong desire to see something more of Christendom than a specimen whaler or two.
ref: 1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chapter 12:
glosses: A swaddling cloth.
examples: text: His garment nought but many ragged clouts, / With thornes together pind and patched was, / The which his naked sides he wrapt abouts;
ref: 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto IX”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, page 129:
text: If I were mad, I ſhould forget my ſonne, / or madly thinke a babe of clowts were he; I am not mad: too well, too well I feele / The different plague of each clamitie.
ref: c. 1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Iohn”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene iv], page 12, columns 1–2:
text: […] a clout upon that head
Where late the diadem stood […]
ref: c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene ii]:
text: We condol’d with each other, and observ’d how wretchedly we look’d, all naked, except a small Clout about our Middles […]
ref: 1743, Robert Drury, The Pleasant, and Surprizing Adventures of Mr. Robert Drury, during his Fifteen Years Captivity on the Island of Madagascar, London, page 74:
text: The Byzantines, wrote Robert of Clari, hooted and jeered from the battlements, "and let down their clouts and showed them their backsides."
ref: 1980, Colin Thubron, Seafarers: The Venetians, page 33:
glosses: A cloth; a piece of cloth or leather; a patch; a rag.
examples: text: Clouts were thin and flat pieces of iron, used it appears to strengthen the box of the wheel; perhaps also for nailing on such other parts of the cart as were particularly exposed to wear.
ref: 1866, James Edwin Thorold Rogers, A History of Agriculture and Prices in England, volume 1, page 546:
glosses: An iron plate on an axletree or other wood to keep it from wearing; a washer.
glosses: A clout nail.
glosses: A piece; a fragment.
Derived terms: beclout
breechclout
breech-clout
car clout
clout chaser
clout goblin
cloutless
clout list
clout-nail
dishclout
ne'er cast a clout till May be out