Meaning

noun woolly usually horned ruminant mammal related to the goat

noun a timid defenseless simpleton who is readily preyed upon

noun a docile and vulnerable person who would rather follow than make an independent decision

originInherited from Middle English schep, schepe, from Anglian Old English sċēp (West Saxon sċēap), from Proto-West Germanic *skāp, from Proto-Germanic *skēpą, of unknown origin. Perhaps from the same Scythian word (compare Ossetian цӕу (cæw, “goat”), Persian چپش (čapiš, “yearling goat”)) which was borrowed into Albanian as cjap, sqap (“buck”) and into Slavic (compare Polish cap). After Kroonen,…

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0