Word Origin & History
rapscallion
1699, alteration of rascallion (1649), a fanciful elaboration of rascal (q.v.). It is the parallel term of now-extinct rampallion (1593), from M.E. ramp (n.) "ill-behaved woman" (c.1450), which is probably connected to the definition of romp in Johnson's Dictionary (1755) as "a rude, awkward, boisterous, untaught girl."