Skeleton

Z skeleton
Difficulty	14
Attacks	Weapon 2d6, Touch 1d6 slowing

Z skeleton
Difficulty	14
Attacks	Weapon 2d6, Touch 1d6 slowing
Base level	12
Base experience	359
Speed	8
Base AC	4
Base MR	0
Alignment	0 (neutral)
Frequency (by normal means)	No random generation
Genocidable	No
Weight	300
Nutritional value	5 (but no corpse)
Size	Medium
Resistances	Cold, Sleep, Poison, Petrification
Resistances conveyed	None
A skeleton: does not breathe. is mindless. has a head, a couple of arms, and a torso. has a thick hide. does not eat. (*) is undead. is normally generated hostile. wanders randomly. is nasty. is strong. can pick up weapons and food. has infravision. never leaves a corpse.
Reference	monst.c#line2182

A skeleton is a magically animated undead creature. Unlike shades, only humanoid creatures can be used to create skeletons. Skeletons have a slowing attack. They have a chance of getting a leather armour (25%); a knife (8%) or a short sword (16%); but no random offensive item.

Orcus Town is the only place where skeletons usually appear. Polypiling multiple objects of material bone (such as unicorn horns) may also create a skeleton.

Chatting with a skeleton (even a tame one) will paralyze you for a few turns.

Old players of the Dungeons & Dragons games are again put on notice that NetHack is different: in D&D, skeletons are the weakest of the classical undead monsters, safe to fight for very inexperienced characters. Not so in NetHack, where they are much tougher, reminiscent perhaps of the classic Ray Harryhausen movies.

Encyclopaedia entry

A skeleton is a magically animated undead creature. Unlike
shades, only a humanoid creature can be used to create a
skeleton. No one knows why this is true, but it has become
an accepted fact amongst the practitioners of the black arts.