Meaning

verb travel on the surface of water

noun a thin layer covering the surface of a liquid

adjective used of milk and milk products from which the cream has been removed

originFrom Middle English skemen, skymen, variants of scumen, from Old French escumer (“to remove scum”), from escume (“froth, foam”), from Frankish *skūm (“froth, foam”), from Proto-Germanic *skūmaz (“foam”), from Proto-Indo-European *skew- (“to cover, conceal”). See scum.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0