† davach, -och Sc. Hist.
In 7 dawach(e.
[OIr. dabach, dabhach vat, tub (perhaps as a corn-measure); cf. the similar uses of pint, pottle, and gallon, as measures of land in Anglo-Irish. In med.L. davaca (erron. -ata).
A conjectured derivation from damh ox, is erroneous. Dabach occurs as a land-measure in the ‘Book of Deir’. (Goidelica (ed. 2) 217.)]
An ancient Scottish measure of land, consisting in the east of Scotland of 4 ploughgates, each of 8 oxgangs; in the west divided into twenty penny-lands. It is said to have averaged 416 acres, but its extent probably varied with the quality of the land.
| 1609 Skene tr. Quon. Attach. xxiii. §11 Provyding that the husband man did haue of him the aucht parte of ane dawache of land [marg. of ane oxgait of land], or mair [unius dauace terre vel plus]. 1794 Statist. Acc. Scot. XIII. 509 There is a davoch of land belonging to this parish. 1797 Ibid. XIX. 290 A davoch contains 32 oxen-gates of 13 acres each, or 416 acres of arable land. c 1817 Hogg Tales & Sk. VI. 269 Heir to seven ploughgates of land, and five half davochs. 1854 C. Innes Orig. Paroch. Scot. II. 335 By an ordinance of King John Balliol in 1292 eight davachs of land, including the islands of Egge and Rume, were among the lands then erected into the Sheriffdom of Skey. 1872 E. W. Robertson Hist. Ess. 127 Davoch, a large pastoral measure at one time answering to the plough-gate, though in actual extent 4 times as large. |