cleit local.
(kliːt)
Also cleet, clett.
[Gael. cléit rocky eminence; cf. clet, f. ON. klettr cliff, crag.]
A small shelter, often used for storing peat, birds' eggs, etc.
| 1825 Jamieson Suppl., Cleit, a cot-house; Aberd[een] Reg[isters]. 1903 Ann. Scot. Nat. Hist. 17 The Fork-tailed Petrels on Borrera, St. Kilda, nest in the ‘cleets’ or little turf houses of the natives, among the sods of dry turf. 1927 Glasgow Herald 1 July 12 Small stone shelters known locally [St. Kilda] as Cleits. 1937 Brit. Birds XXX. 236 It [sc. the Fork-tailed Petrel] will eventually be definitely proved to breed among the stone ‘cleits’ built by the men who visit the island annually to collect young gannets. 1952 J. Fisher Fulmar vi. 130 These were the famous St. Kilda cletts, or cleits. |