▪ I. spleet, n. Now dial. and rare.
[a. MDu. splete (WFlem. splete), spleet (Du. spleet) or MLG. (and LG.) splete, NFris. splēt, related to split v.]
A small strip of split wood or willow.
| 1609 C. Butler Fem. Mon. iii. §9 If the hiue be then fourteene inches ouer within, it may wel receiue foure spleets. 1657 S. Purchas Pol. Flying-Ins. 60 Mr. Southern and others..advise, that if Bees finde fault with a Hive, and will not continue in it, to pull out the spleats. a 1679 Sir J. Moore Eng. Interest (1703) 104 Your Hive being pruned put in your spleets. 1704 Dict. Rust. (1726) s.v. Bee-hives, Either Wicker-Hives made with Spleets of Wood,..or Straw-Hives. 1766 Museum Rust. VI. 2 Bind their stems together with a spleet of willow, or some tough wood. Ibid. 3 A small wreath, made of spleet, is slipped on the upper end of the staff. 1899– in Eng. Dial. Dict. |
Hence † spleet v.1 trans., to fit (a bee-hive) with slips of wood. Obs.
| 1609 C. Butler Fem. Mon. iii. §9 This is the easiest & quickest way of spleeting a hiue. 1661 Worlidge Syst. Agric. (1681) 186 The way they usually Spleet the ordinary Strawn and Daubed Hives, every Countrey Coridon understands. |
▪ II. spleet, v.2 Chiefly Sc.
[Obscurely related to split v. Cf. spleet n. and LG. spleeten (rare).]
trans. and intr. To split.
| 1585 Higins tr. Junius' Nomencl. 62/2 Piscem exdorsuare,..to spleete out, or part alongest the ridge bone iust in the midst. 1606 Shakes. Ant. & Cl. ii. vii. 131 Mine owne tongue Spleet's what it speakes. 1647 Hexham i, To Spleet a fish, een visch splyten. 1701 J. Brand Orkney ii. (1703) 25 At all times it is highly dangerous..to pass through between the Isles, tho with small Boats, because of the many blind Rocks lying there, upon which sometimes the Inhabitants do spleet. c 1730 W. Starrat in Ramsay Poems (1760) 222 We'll to the harning drive, When in fresh lizar they get spleet and rive. 1828 Moir Mansie Wauch xii, Men..holding their sides, laughing like to spleet them. 1866 in Edmondston Gloss. Shetl. & Orkney 115. 1900 Shetl. News 22 Sept. (E.D.D.), Da auld axe ta spleet da lamb's head wi'. |