peep of day
[See peep n.2 1 b.]
1. The first appearance of daylight, the earliest dawn.
| [1530: see peep n.2 1 b.] 1577–87 Holinshed Chron. III. 1138/1 The morrow.., by the peepe of daie, all the batteries began. 1882 J. Parker Apost. Life I. 118 The first sacrifice was offered at the very peep of day. |
| fig. a 1836 Mrs. T. Mortimer (title) The Peep of Day; or a Series of the earliest religious Instruction the Infant Mind is capable of receiving. |
| attrib. 1852 Smedley L. Arundel 612 Always supposing our peep-of-day amusement goes as it should do. |
2. peep-of-day boys, a Protestant organization in the North of Ireland (
c 1784–95), whose members visited the houses of their Roman Catholic opponents (see
defender 1 d) at daybreak in search of arms. So
peep-of-day clergyman,
peep of day principle; also
peep-o'-dayism. Also
transf.| 1780 A. Young Tour in Ireland ii. vi. 30 In England we have heard much of whiteboys, steelboys, oakboys, peep-of-day-boys, &c... All but the whiteboys were among the manufacturing protestants in the north. 1807 Vancouver Agric. Devon (1813) 468 The insurgent banditti of Tories, Hearts of Steel, Peep-o'day Boys, White Boys, &c. 1825 C. M. Westmacott English Spy I. 267 [He] joined the peep of day boys in full cry. 1845 Syd. Smith Fragm. Irish Rom. Cath. Ch. Wks. 1859 II. 340/2 A peep-of-day clergyman will no longer preach to a peep-of-day congregation. 1890 Lecky Eng. in 18th C. xxvi. VII. 20 A corps of volunteers which had been originally raised on Peep of Day principles. 1922 Joyce Ulysses 44 Raw facebones under his peep of day boy's hat. |
3. A local name of the plant Star of Bethlehem,
Ornithogalum umbellatum (
Shropsh. Wordbk. 1879).