Other forms: shrouds
A shroud is a cloth wrapped round a body, or a covering that hides. A burial shroud, shrouded in mist, shrouded in secrecy.
The literal sense belongs to burial, and shroud burial without a coffin is legal in Britain and increasingly chosen. The figurative use is much the commoner: shrouded in secrecy and shrouded in mist are both fixed phrases.
1nounshroudA cloth wrapped round a body, or a covering that hides.
“The body was wrapped in a white shroud and buried the same day.”
shroud is a covering.
Old English scrud meant a garment or clothing. The burial sense narrowed later.
Proto-Germanic
*skrūdą — shroud, dress, attire
Old English
sċrūd
Middle English
shroud
English, today
shroud
From Middle English shroud, from Old English sċrūd, from Proto-Germanic skrūdą (“shroud, dress, attire”). Compare Proto-Germanic skrūdijaną (“to shroud”). Cognate with Old Norse skrúð, Swedish skrud (“shroud”), Danish and Norwegian skrud (“splendid attire”)).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA