▪ I. sheat, n. dial.
Also 6 pl. shettes, 7–9 sheet, 8 scheat, 9 shet.
[Cogn. w. the synonymous shoat2; the relation between the two forms is obscure.]
A pig under a year old.
| 1534 Inv. in Lett. & Pap. Hen. VIII, LXXXIII. lf. 118 (P.R.O.) Yong hogges called Shettes. 1572 in Pegge's Kenticisms (E.D.S.) s.v., One sow, two sheetes. 1607 Topsell Four-f. Beasts 661 In English we call a young swine a Pigge, A weaning Pigge, a sheate, a Yealke, and so foorth. 1653 Urquhart Rabelais i. xxxvii, Three hundred barrow⁓pigs or sheats. 1736 J. Lewis Isle of Tenet (ed. 2) 38 Scheat, a little Pig spay'd. 1852 in N. & Q. Ser. i. VI. 339/1 They [Kentish men] defined ‘sheets’ to be ‘pigs between the age of six and ten months’. 1875 Sussex Gloss., Sheat, a young hog of the first year. |
▪ II. † sheat, a. Obs. rare—1.
? Trim, neat.
| c 1590 Greene Fr. Bacon vii. (1630) 25 Neat, sheat and fine, As brisk as a cup of wine. |
▪ III. sheat, sheat(e
obs. ff. sheath2, sheet.