leasow

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English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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From Middle English leesewe, lesewe, leswe, from Old English lǣs (pasture), from Proto-West Germanic *lāsu (pasture).

Pronunciation

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Noun

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leasow (plural leasows)

  1. (now rare, dialectal, historical) (Green) land as opposed to flood or desert; a pasture.
    • 1803 July 25, Hester Piozzi, Thraliana:
      Reflexions in her Book, strike one as a Statue does among the tangled Thickets of the Leasowes [] .
    • 1826, Thomas Gill, The Technical repository:
      The oxen which are brought on in succession, run the first summer in the park, and in the leasows and temporary straw-yards in the winter; [...]
    • 2012, Christopher Dyer, A Country Merchant, 1495-1520:
      Lords could create a leasow by fencing off part of their demesne, if it was held in a block rather than being scattered over the fields and intermingled with the land of tenants.
    • 2013, Eric Kerridge, Agrarian Problems in the Sixteenth Century and After:
      Imprimis we do present upon our oaths that one Gilbert Wheeler gentleman enclosed a leasow called the Hide containing 20 acres which was common about 10 years past with the fields there.

Verb

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leasow (third-person singular simple present leasows, present participle leasowing, simple past and past participle leasowed)

  1. (transitive, archaic or dialectal) To feed or pasture

References

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