gauntlet

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   an armored glove; an ordeal or punishment run between two rows

   She threw down the gauntlet, daring her rival to compete.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Gauntlet has two unrelated histories. The armoured glove, borrowed in Middle English from Old French, underlies throw down the gauntlet, from the custom of issuing a challenge by throwing down one’s glove. In run the gauntlet, however, gauntlet is an alteration of gantlope, from Swedish gatlopp, combining gata “lane” with lopp “course”; it referred to a military punishment in which someone ran between two rows of men who struck him.

From Old French 'gantelet', diminutive of 'gant' ('glove'), of Germanic origin (Frankish '*want'); the 'ordeal' sense is from an unrelated word 'gantlope' (Swedish 'gatlopp'), later assimilated to 'gauntlet'.

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