enseam
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
English[edit]
Etymology[edit]
Verb[edit]
enseam (third-person singular simple present enseams, present participle enseaming, simple past and past participle enseamed)
- (obsolete) To remove the surplus fat from a horse or (in falconry) a bird.
- c. 1503–1512, John Skelton, Ware the Hauke; republished in John Scattergood, editor, John Skelton: The Complete English Poems, 1983, →OCLC, page 63, lines 79–83:
- She was not clene ensaymed,
She was not wel reclaymed;
But the fawconer unfayned
Was moch more febler brayned.
- 1619, Edmund Bert, An approued treatise of hawkes and hawking[1], book 3, page 102:
- If you shall giue her this water with her meate, you shall finde admirable profit therein: It is very good wherewith to ensayme a hawke of any kinde, for a long-winged hawke that is in summer flowne to the field, there neuer was or can be vsed any thing better, […]
- (obsolete) To sew or stitch up in a covering
References[edit]
- OED 2nd edition 1989
- QI Annual 2007