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If you get off -free, you are not punished, even though many people feel you should have been. You walk away with no fine, no blame that sticks. It is almost always this set phrase: get off -free, or get away -free. Though actually the here is not Scotland and not a Scottish person. Hundreds of years ago, a was a tax or a payment you had to put in. Scot-free first meant you did not have to pay that tax. The old tax-word died; the phrase stayed, and now it is about escaping punishment. A little colourful, fine in speech and in writing.
全身而退、沒被處罰。這個 scot 不是蘇格蘭。
組成scot (an old word for a tax or a payment you had to make) + free (not having to pay it). From Old English scotfreo, exempt from that tax. Everyday English kept only this phrase.
原始詞典資料2 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，原文照列，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
scot-freeadv/ˌskɒtˈfɹi/
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Without consequences or penalties, free without payment.
- to get off scot-free
- To ſay the Ieſuites are all ſmattred vvith Atheiſme, I vvill not: and to ſay, that any of them all are abſolutely ſcotfree from it, I cannot: it is ſo repugnant from their ovvne principles.
scot-freeadj/ˌskɒtˈfɹi/
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archaicFree of scot, free of tax.
資料來源：英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary（CC BY-SA 4.0）。 原文照列，未經改寫。