▪ I. rammish, a.1 Now dial.
(ˈræmɪʃ)
Also 4–6 -issh, -yssch, etc., 6–8 ramish.
[app. f. ram n.1]
1. a. Of smell, taste, etc.: Rank, strong, highly disagreeable.
| c 1386 Chaucer Can. Yeom. Prol. & T. 334 They stynken as a goot Hir sauour is so rammyssh and so hoot. 1562 Turner Herbal ii. 62 b, Sampharitik..hath a rammishe or buckishe styngkyng smell. 1657 W. Coles Adam in Eden cclxvii, Purging away thereby the ranke and rammish savour. 1719 D'Urfey Pills V. 269 Butchers..sell a lump of Ramish scent; For Weather Mutton. |
b. Having a rank smell or taste.
| c 1430 Lydg. Reas. & Sens. 3378 Whan she is hoot, Rammysh taraged as a goot. 1530 Palsgr. 322/1 Rammysshe, yll savoured as a man or beest that is to rancke. 1600 Surflet Countrie Farme vii. xxii. 838 Blacke dogs..delight most in coursing the rammish and strong sented beastes, as wilde bores, foxes [etc.]. 1677 Plot Oxfordsh. 94 Cats, or such like ramish creatures. 1863 Mrs. Toogood Spec. Yorksh. Dial., This cheese..is rather rammish. 1894 Clark Russell Good Ship Mohock I. 140 Open that sky⁓light..Its growing durned rammish down here. |
c. fig. of persons, things, qualities, etc.
| 1610 Histrio-m. iii. 310 Fat Ignorance, and rammish Barbarisme. c 1611 Chapman Iliad iii. Comm. (1857) 79 In this poesy, redundant I affirm him, and rammish. 1656 Earl of Monmouth tr. Boccalini's Advts. fr. Parnass. i. xxiii. (1674) 25 Those preambles, which smelt so rammish. |
† 2. ? Lascivious, lustful. Obs.
Perh. belongs to rammish a.2 (cf. sense 2 there).
| 1577 Stanyhurst Descr. Irel. in Holinshed (1809) VI. 32 Rutting wives make often rammish husbands, as our proverb dooth inferre. 1635 Quarles Embl. ii. i. 29 Goe, Cupids rammish Pandar, goe. |
Hence ˈrammishly adv.
| 1567 J. Maplet Nat. Hist. 63 At haruest time his leaues smel rammishly, in maner like the Goate. 1623 Cockeram 1, Hircosically, smelling rammishly. a 1693 Urquhart's Rabelais iii. xii. 95 More rammishly lascivious than a Buck. |
▪ II. rammish, a.2 Now only dial.
(ˈræmɪʃ)
Also 6 -ysshe, 7–9 ramish.
[Alteration of ramage a., perh. after prec., but cf. rammist.]
† 1. = ramage a. 1. Obs.
| 1526 Skelton Magnyf. 1831 My hawke is rammysshe. 1593 Tell-Troth's N.Y. Gift 88 The rammish hauke is tamd by carefull heed. 1653 Walton Angler i. 12 The Ramish Hawk, the Haggard, and the two sorts of Lentners. |
2. Wild, violent. Now only dial.
Perh. to some extent associated with ram n.1
| 1607 Markham Caval. i. 67 Stond horses naturally..are exceeding rammish, & vnruely. 1807 J. Stagg Poems 134 What avail'd their ramish routs, Wi' Sampson leyke exertions. 1869 in Lonsdale Gloss. |
▪ III. rammish
variant of rammis v. Sc.