Dermatology

The sixth entry is der Schorf, and an English reader has met it before under another spelling. « Scurf » is its cousin: the two go back to the same old Germanic word, and both still live on the skin. What they name has drifted apart. « Scurf » is loose flakes of dead skin, the dandruff on a dark collar. Der Schorf is the dry crust that forms over a graze or a burst blister while the skin beneath it closes — what English calls « a scab ». So Lass den Schorf in Ruhe is the warning not to pick at it, never a remark about flaking; for flakes German says die Schuppen, and for the process die Schuppung, which stands one entry further down. The garden shares the clinical sense: der Apfelschorf is apple scab. These pages explain words and give no medical advice.