Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Flay

Flay (flā) , transitive verb

[Old English flean, flan, Anglo-Saxon fleán; akin to Dutch vlaen, Icelandic flā, Swedish flå, Danish flaae, compare Lithuanian pleszti to tear, plyszti, v.i., to burst, tear; perh. akin to English flag a flat stone, flaw.]

To skin; to strip off the skin or surface of; as, to flay an ox; to flay the green earth.
With her nails She 'll flay thy wolfish visage. — Shakespeare