▪ I. sucken, n.1 Sc.
(ˈsʌkən)
Forms: 5 sukkin, swken, 5–7 suckin, 6 su(c)kyn, 9 shucken, 7– sucken.
[Variant of soken. The orig. meaning is ‘resort’ (sc. to a particular mill).]
1. The duty and liability of tenants within a district astricted to a mill. (See thirlage 2 and cf. soken 2 b.) † Also occas. the meal ground at such a mill.
| 1423 Charters, etc. of Edinb. (1871) 55 With the suckins, thryl multris, and al freedomes langand thairto. 1488 Acta Dom. Audit. (1839) 124/2 Þe wrangwis withhalding of þe þrell multure and sukkin awing to þe said alexandris mylne. 15.. Aberd. Reg. V. 16 (Jam.), He com nocht to grynd his quhyt in thair mill as he that aucht suckyn thareto. 1641 Acts Parl. Scot., Chas. I (1814) V. 657/1 Sex bollis of moulter or sucking quhilkis perteinet to the Carmelite freires of the said burcht. 1711 in Nairne Peerage Evidence (1874) 138 All and haill the lands of Hardhaugh and Chimieshill with y⊇ multures suckens sequells and knaveship therof. 1806 R. Jamieson Pop. Ballads I. 294 Her daddie, a cannie ald carl, Had shucken and mouter a fouth. |
2. The lands astricted to a mill; = thirl n.2 1 c; also, the population of such lands.
Cf. insucken, outsucken.
| 1754 Erskine Princ. Law Scot. ii. ix. (1757) 210 The lands astricted, (which are called also the thirle or sucken). 1799 J. Robertson Agric. Perth 397 The greatest difficulty arises, where the mill belongs to one proprietor and the sucken to another. 1820 Scott Monast. xiii, Those of the Sucken, or enthralled ground, were liable in penalties, if, deviating from this thirlage,..they carried their grain to another mill. 1872 Innes Lect. Scot. Legal Antiq. ii. 47 The sucken, as we call the population thirled to a mill. |
b. transf. The area of a bailiff's jurisdiction; the district within which one practises or carries on business.
| a 1688 J. Wallace Descr. Orkney (1693) 93 Sucken, A Bailiffrie, so much ground as is vnder the Bailiffs Jurisdiction. 1871 W. Alexander J. Milne's Songs & Poems Introd. p. ix, He afterwards commenced business as a shoemaker..in the parish of Durris, where he had a sufficient ‘sucken’ to employ two men besides himself. 1871 ― Johnny Gibb (1873) 117 The younger Dr. Drogemweal, who had settled ‘doon throu'’, so as to be beyond the limits of his father's ‘sucken’. |
Hence ˈsuckener, a tenant of a sucken; ˈsuckening, the astriction of tenants to a mill.
| 1636 Reg. Mag. Sig. Scot. 215/2 In lie suckning, thirling, et astringendo burgenses. 1754 Erskine Princ. Law Scot. ii. ix. (1757) 214 Where there is neither an explicite constitution of thirlage, nor proof of services of any sort, performed by the suckeners, the dominant tenement can claim none. 1797 Statist. Acc. Scot. XIX. 67 The millers..oppress the suckeners. 1820 Scott Monast. xiii. note, Perquisites demanded by the miller, and submitted to or resisted by the Suckener as circumstances permitted. |
▪ II. ˈsucken, n.2 dial.
Also -an.
[Obscure formation on the root of suck v.]
Wet, moisture; liquid manure; = sock n.3 2, 2 b. Hence ˈsuckeny a.
| 1615 W. Lawson Country Housew. Garden (1626) 7 The sucken of your Dwelling-house, descending into your Orchard (if it be cleanly conueighed) is good. Ibid. 41 The earth that feeds them decaying..must either haue supply of sucken, or else leaue thriuing and growing. 1878 Cumberld. Gloss., Suckan [mispr. Suckam]..Suckeny land, moist land of good quality. |
▪ III. ˈsucken, a. rare.
[Short for bond-sucken (cf. love-soken s.v. love n.1 16), properly a n. = compulsory resort of a tenant to a mill for the grinding of his corn.]
Astricted to a mill; = thirl a.
| [1523 Fitzherb. Surv. 9 b, The lordes tenauntes be called bonde socon. 1859 Dickinson Gloss. Words & Phr. Cumberld. 11 Some farms are bound by tenure to carry their corn to the manorial mill to be multured and ground, and are ‘bond-sucken’ to that mill.] |
| 1878 J. Davidson Inverurie Introd. 7 The corns sucken to the mill. Ibid. v. 178 Conglass and Drimmies were sucken to the very ancient Mill of Inveramsay. 1882 in Jamieson's Sc. Dict. |
▪ IV. † sucken
obs. Sc. pa. pple. of sink v. (Cf. drucken.)
| 1535 Stewart Cron. Scot. (Rolls) I. 20 His cristell eyne wes suckin in his heid. |