carabin

appeared in the writings of [Pierre de Bourdeille] with the sense of "foreign captains". Probably related to escarbot, a burrowing insect (see scarab); the Middle French escarrabin designated a person dressed in black who buried the dead during major plagues, and then by irony, carabin de Saint-Côme meant "surgeon", as he was the patron of this corporation. Hence the current usual sense of "medical student" (senses 3 and 4).