▪ I. smut, n.
(smʌt)
Also 7–8 smutt, 8–9 smoot.
[Related to smut v. Cf. LG. schmutt, G. schmutz, in sense 1; also MHG. smuz, smutz fat, grease, G. schmutz (Sw. smuts, Da. smuds) dirt, filth. See also smot n.1
The adj. smutty is recorded earlier in most of the senses, and the n. may be mainly a back-formation from this.]
1. a. A fungous disease affecting various plants, esp. cereals, which are spoiled by the grain being wholly or partly converted into a blackish powder; also, one or other of the fungi (species of Ustilagineæ) causing the disease.
| 1665 Phil. Trans. I. 93 Meldew, Blasting, Smut. 1669 Worlidge Syst. Agric. (1681) 214 Smut seems to proceed from the same cause. a 1722 Lisle Husb. (1757) 132 Such grain was apt to carry a smut. 1796 Withering Brit. Pl. (ed. 3) IV. 388 This is the Smut, so frequently found upon the ears of different sorts of growing corn, and also upon grasses. 1834 Brit. Husb. I. 379 (L.U.K.), The practice of steeping seed-wheat..applies rather to smut, than to rust or mildew. 1875 H. C. Wood Therap. (1879) 555 The Smut of Indian Corn (Ustilago maidis) appears to have active medicinal properties. |
b. A smutted grain. rare—1.
| 1799 Hull Advertiser 23 Feb. 1/1 These machines..do not crush the smuts or bunt in wheat. |
2. A black mark or stain; a smudge. Also fig.
| 1664 H. More Myst. Iniq. 474 That there is not the least smutt of Antichristianism in Episcopacy itself. 1671 Woodhead St. Teresa ii. ii. 12 All that is fair..in this world, is but a smut with a cole. 1830 ‘B. Moubray’ Dom. Poultry, etc. 163 The smut consists of a black spot on the side of the rabbit's nose. 1861 Fraser's Mag. June 772 A black mark on his [sc. a rabbit's] nose, which is called a butterfly smut. |
3. Coal-mining. Bad, soft, earthy coal.
| 1686 Plot Staffordsh. 146 Above ground they look for a smut as they call it, i.e. a friable black earth. 1796 Kirwan Elem. Min. (ed. 2) II. 51 Smut seems also a variety of this species [sc. inflammable mineral carbon], but more impure. 1799 ― Geol. Ess. 292 The uppermost seam of coal is commonly soft and dusty, it is vulgarly called smut. 1806 Phil. Trans. XCVI. 346 Smoot and Fire Clay. 1829 Glover Hist. Derby I. 59 Measures of strata:..Soft coal or smut 2 ft. 10 in. 1860– in mining glossaries. |
4. a. Soot or sooty matter.
| 1693 Dryden, etc. Juvenal vi. (1726) 71 The steam of Lamps still hanging on her cheeks In ropy Smut. 1712 E. Cooke Voy. S. Sea 45 Spotted down the Cheeks with white Clay, and some black Streaks of Smut. 1790 Burke Let. Noble Lord Wks. VIII. 97 Our most salutary and most beautiful institutions yield nothing but dust and smut. 1846 Landor Imag. Conv. II. 91 The furnace is mere smut, and no bellows to blow the embers. 1893 Scribner's Mag. June 778/1 The remotest articles of furniture are rife with infinitesimal smut. |
b. A particle of sooty matter.
| 1806 Southey Lett. (1856) I. 375 That cursed composition of smoke, dust, smuts, human breath, and marsh vapour. 1849 Lytton Caxtons xiv. ii, A joyous dance of those monads, called vulgarly smuts. 1894 Mrs. Ritchie Chapters Mem. viii. 106 A lady sitting with an umbrella in the drizzle of rain and falling smuts from the funnel. |
c. A very minute insect.
| 1899 Daily News 28 Dec. 6/4 A trout..grubs in the weeds, chases larvæ, and revels in almost invisible smuts. |
5. Indecent or obscene language.
| 1698 J. Collier Immor. Stage i. (1730) 4 The Modern Poets seem to use Smut as the old Ones did Machines, to relieve a fainting Invention. 1707 Refl. upon Ridicule 206 'Tis a miserable way of Pleasing, to scatter Smut in all your Stories. 1760–2 Goldsmith Cit. W. xlix, The gentlemen talked smut, the ladies laughed and were angry. 1821 Scott Kenilw. ii, Drunken freaks, and drunken quarrels, and smut, and blasphemy. 1858 Carlyle Fredk. Gt. vi. iv. (1872) II. 173 Discourse of a cheerful or of a serious nature,..and not the least smut permitted. 1886 Spectator 4 Dec. 1621 The public must have titles, or smut, or murder, and wishes in its heart always to have two of them together. |
† 6. slang. (See quot.) Obs.—0
| 1812 J. H. Vaux Flash Dict., Smut, a copper boiler, or furnace. |
7. attrib., as (sense 1) smut bag, smut corn, smut fungus, smut mill, smut machine, smut spore, etc.; (sense 5) smut book, smut-note; smut shop, etc.; smut-hunting ppl. adj.; smut-grass U.S., a rush-grass (Sporobolus Indicus), the spikes of which are usually blackened by a smut; smut-hound [cf. hound n.1 4 e] colloq., one who seeks to censor or suppress smut (sense 5), esp. in literature.
| 1712 Addison Spect. No. 361 ¶13 He teaches the Smut-note, the Fustian-note, the Stupid-note. 1731 in 6th Rep. Dep. Kpr. App. ii. 119 A new Machine for cleaning Wheat..is contrived to take away the stains, smut bags, and other trumpery. 1790 Trans. Soc. Arts VIII. 32 Wheat, sown too long on the same spot, without changing the seed, will generally become smutt and hen-corn. 1818 Niles' Reg. XV. 80/1 A smutt mill, for cleaning wheat of smut, is in operation at Plattsburg. 1850 Mary Wedlake's Priced List Farming Implements 25 A Smut Machine, to clean damaged grain. 1852 Appleton's Dict. Mach. II. 588 Smut Machine..for cleaning all kinds of grain. 1868 Rep. U.S. Commiss. Agric. (1869) 37 A few cattle in Massachusetts have died from eating ‘smut corn’. 1897 W. G. Smith tr. Tubeuf's Dis. Plants 275 The Ustilagineae or Smut-fungi are distinguished by their dark-coloured or black chlamydospores. Ibid. 276 In this way any adherent smut-spores are killed. 1927 H. L. Mencken Let. 2 Dec. (1961) 305 Of my inventions I am vainest of Bible Belt, booboisie, smut-hound and Boobus americanus. 1928 D. H. Lawrence Let. 9 Mar. (1962) II. 1042 Mason wrote me rather scared about the censor and smut⁓hunting authorities. 1930 Auden Poems 69 Lawrence was brought down by smut-hounds, Blake went dotty as he sang. 1930 Publishers' Weekly 31 May 2737/2 The confiscation of dirty picture postals and smut books. 1961 John o' London's 28 Sept. 357/3 The bulk of The High Price of Pornography is devoted to a survey of the rancid avalanche of smut magazines..which are pulped out in the States. 1965 E. L. Myles Emperor of Peace i. xiii. 135 He bought..a two-inch stone burr mill complete with smut mill, cleaner and water wheel. 1967 Spectator 1 Dec. 683/1 Eminent men of letters would not be dismissed as fools or smuthounds. 1977 Zigzag Apr. 28/3 He said we were turning lunchtime into a 42nd street smut shop. |
▪ II. smut, v.
(smʌt)
Also 7 smutt, smoot.
[Cf. smot v., and MHG. smutzen (G. schmutzen) to smear, dirty.]
1. trans. To mark with some black or dirty substance; to blacken, smudge.
| α 1587 J. Harmar tr. Beza's Serm. 195 No man can like to be smutted and blatched in his face. 1624 Middleton Game at Chess iii. i, W. Pawn. White quickly soils you know. B. J. Pawn...Get thee gone then, I shall smut thee. 1668 H. More Div. Dial. iii. iv. (1713) 187 A Company..whom some unlucky Wag has smutted with his sooty and greazy fingers. 1705 Addison Italy, Pavia 26 The Inside is so smutted with Dust, and the Smoak of Lamps. 1752 Johnson Rambler No. 188 ¶12 Contriving to smut the nose of any stranger who was to be initiated into the club. 1836 Whately in Miss E. J. Whately Life (1866) I. 366 He who wrestles with a chimney-sweeper is sure to be smutted. 1877 Daily News 27 Dec. 6/1 The dingy whitewashed walls, smutted by the smoke of the tottering stove. |
| β 1657 W. Morice Coena quasi κοινὴ xxxiii. 306 To keep my cloaths from being smootted by a Chimnie-sweeper. |
b. fig. To stain with some fault or imperfection.
| α 1601 Dent Pathw. Heaven 202 What is the cause why some one sinne doth so blot and smut the most excellent men? 1674 Cotton in Flatman's Poems 47 You no prophane, no obscene language use To smut your paper or defile your Muse. |
| β a 1661 Fuller Worthies (1840) II. 102 Considering the sottishness of superstition in the age he lived in, he is less smooted therewith than any of his contemporaries. |
2. To affect (grain) with smut.
| 1626 Bacon Sylva §497 There falleth also Mildew upon Corn and smutteth it. 1812 Sir J. Sinclair Syst. Husb. Scot. i. 325 Having often observed in his wheat fields, a few ridges alternately clean and smutted. 1841 Hood Tale Trumpet 761 Though the wishes that Witches utter Can..Smut and mildew the corn on the stalk. |
b. intr. Of grain: To be affected by smut.
| 1657 S. Purchas Pol. Flying-Ins. 143 Corn thus imbibed, and then sown without lime, will not smut. 1677 Plot Oxfordsh. 244 Wheat following the dung Cart on their best Land, is the more liable to smut. 1745 Gentl. Mag. 31 Corn managed in this manner is not apt to smut or mildew. |
3. trans. To make obscene.
| 1722 Welsted Prol. Steele's Consc. Lovers 11 Another smuts his Scene (a cunning Shaver), Sure of the Rakes and of the Wenches Favour. |
4. intr. Of fish: To rise at, or feed on, smuts.
| 1889 Sat. Rev. 18 May 612/2 These demonstrations are made by trout bulging, tailing, smutting, or minnowing. 1892 Field 4 June 838/2 The fish were smutting or bulging on the shallows. |