▪ I. milt, n.
(mɪlt)
Forms: 1 multi, milti, 1, 3–6 milte, 4–6 mylte, 5–6 mylt, 6 melte, 4, 6– (now dial.) melt, 6 milt.
[OE. milte str. masc., also wk. fem., spleen = OFris. milte fem., spleen, MDu. milte (Du. milt) fem., spleen, also milt of fish, OHG. milzi neut. (MHG. milze neut., mod.G. milz fem.), ON. milti neut., spleen (OSw. mjälte, mjälter, milter, mod.Sw. mjelte masc., Da. milt, spleen, Norw. mjelte masc., spleen, milt of fish):—OTeut. types *miltjo-, *miltjôn-, perh. f. the root of melt v., with reference to the supposed digestive function of the spleen. The sense ‘spawn of fish’ may have been adopted from Du.; as the milt of a fish is of soft substance like the spleen, the transferred use was not unnatural, but it was no doubt helped to gain currency by the resemblance in sound between milt and milk (Du. milch: see milk n.), the older name for the soft roe of fish. The sense also exists in Norwegian, where it is to be noted that mjelte milt is homophonous with mjelte a milking, connected with ON. mialta to milk.
The spelling multi in the Epinal Glossary cannot be explained with certainty, but it certainly cannot represent an ablaut-variant, of which there is no trace in any Teut. lang.]
I. 1. The spleen in mammals; also, an analogous organ in other vertebrate animals.
| a 700 Epinal Gloss. 594 Lien, multi. c 725 Corpus Gloss. (Hessels) L. 172 Lien, milte. Ibid. S. 472 Splenis, milte. c 1000 Sax. Leechd. II. 242 Hu se milte bið emlang & gædertenᵹe þære wambe hæfð þynne filmene sio hæfð fætte & þicce ædra. c 1250 Death 171 in O.E. Misc. 178 Nu schal for-rotien..Þi mahe and þi milte þi liure and þi lunge. 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. v. xli. (1495) 157 The substaunce of the mylte is blacke. c 1489 Caxton Sonnes of Aymon i. 52 His nayles stacke in to my lyuer and my mylte. 1533 Elyot Cast. Helthe (1541) 22 The splene or mylte is of yl juice, for it is the chamber of melancholy. 1658 Rowland tr. Moufet's Theat. Ins. 1110 In the milts of Sheep..innumerable worms are oft-times found. c 1720 W. Gibson Farrier's Guide i. ii. (1738) 12 The Spleen, or Milt is a soft, spungy Substance. 1764 Museum Rust. II. li. 146 The melt or spleen was very small and thin. 1847 W. C. L. Martin Ox 130 Inflammation of the spleen or melt. |
b. attrib. and
Comb., as
milt-grown a., affected by an enlarged spleen;
milt-like a., resembling the substance of the mammalian milt;
milt-pain, a disease amongst swine;
milt-sickness, a disease of the spleen amongst cattle; so
milt-sick a.;
† milt-vein (see
quot.);
milt-wort = miltwaste.
| 1731 Gentl. Mag. I. 101 [The world] has an ugly hoskey cough, and is *milt-grown. |
| 1822–34 Good's Study Med. (ed. 4) I. 187 One [polypus] is termed *miltlike by Professor Munro. |
| 1704 Dict. Rust. et Urb., *Milt-pain is a Disease in Hogs, proceeding from greediness of eating Mast. |
| 1882 Times of Natal 8 June, He never knew of a case of illness from eating a *melt-sick ox. |
| Ibid., An ox suffering from *melt-sickness. |
| 1597 A. M. tr. Guillemeau's Fr. Chirurg. 29 b/2 In the left hande, shee [the Liver vayne] is called the *miltvayne. |
| 1611 Cotgr., Scolopendrie, Spleenwort, *Milt⁓wort, Finger-fearn. 1668 Wilkins Real Char. Index, Miltwort [text p. 71 Miltwast]. |
2. transf. (See
quot. 1599.)
| 1587 L. Mascall Govt. Cattle (1596) 106 If a colt when he is fold do not cast his milt, husbandmen say he will not liue long,..some colt will cast two miltes, no horse that liues xii. yeares hath any milt within him. 1599 A. M. tr. Gabelhouer's Bk. Physicke 23/1 In the first foalinge of a Mare, her Foale hath..on the tung a peece of fleshe which resembleth the Milt of an Oxe, and of some is also called a Milt. 1677 Johnson in Ray's Corr. (1848) 128 Horsemen have not agreed what that is the foal is said to sneeze, which they call a milt. |
II. 3. The roe or spawn of the male fish; the ‘soft roe’ of fishes.
| 1483 Caxton Gold. Leg. 77 b/1 Open the fysshe and take to the herte the galle and the mylte. 1530 Palsgr. 245/1 Mylte [of] a fysshe, la laicte; laicte de poisson. 1596 Dalrymple tr. Leslie's Hist. Scot. I. 19 Quhen now thay ar gutted, and the meltis takne out, thay [etc.]. 1611 Cotgr., Laicte, the milt, or soft roe, of fishes. 1653 Walton Angler viii. 162 You shall scarce or never take a Male Carp without a Melt, or a Female without a Roe or Spawn. 1718 J. Chamberlayne Relig. Philos. (1730) II. xxii. §36 Some of the Females discharge their Spawn, and the males their Melt or Seed in the Water near each other. 1884 Braithwaite Salmonidæ Westmld. i. 3 Milt is found in the males and ova in females. |
b. attrib., as
milt-like a., resembling the contents of the soft roe of a fish.
| 1808 Edin. Rev. XI. 322 The milt-like fluid of the drones might be seen in the cells. |
▪ II. milt, v. (
mɪlt)
[f. prec.] trans. ‘To impregnate the roe or spawn of the female fish’ (J.).
| 1694 Motteux Rabelais v. xxxi. (1737) 143, I..saw..Fish..milting, spawning. 1884 Field 6 Dec. 787/1 A female [char] gave 146 eggs, which were milted from a male of the same hybrid race. |