▪ I. thew, n.1
(θjuː)
Forms: 1–3 þeaw, þeau, (1 ðeow), 2–3 þæw, 2–5 þew, þewe, 3 þeauw, þeuw, þeæw, þeu, 4 theaw, 4–5 theu, thue, 4–9 thewe, (5 thegh), 4– thew.
[OE. þéaw = OS. thau usage, custom, habit, OHG. thau (dau) discipline. Not recorded outside WGer. langs. Ulterior etymology uncertain.]
† 1. a. A custom, usage, general practice (e.g. of a people, community, or class). Obs.
| Beowulf 360 Cuþe he duᵹuðe þeaw. c 893 K. ælfred Oros. i. x. §2 Siþþan wæs hiera þeaw. c 950 Lindisf. Gosp. John xix. 40 Sua ðeau Iuðeum [Rushw. ðeow iudea, Ags. Gosp. iudea þ[e]aw, Hatton G. iudea þæw] is bybyrᵹe. c 1200 Trin. Coll. Hom. 47 Wich þeau was on þe olde laȝe. Ibid., Swich þeu wes bi þan daȝen. |
† b. pl. Customs ordained; ordinances. Obs.
| 13.. E.E. Allit. P. B. 544 In de-voydynge þe vylanye þat venkquyst his þewez. Ibid. 755. 1624 Quarles Job vii. 7 Thy sacred Thewes, and sweet Instructions, did Helpe those were falling, rays'd up such as slid. |
† 2. a. A custom or habit of an individual; manner of behaving or acting; hence, a personal quality (mental or moral); a characteristic, attribute, trait. Chiefly in pl. Obs.
| c 888 K. ælfred Boeth. xxvii. §2 Wisdom..ælces godes þeawes he ᵹefyllð þone þe hine lufað. c 893 ― Oros. vi. xiv. §1 He wæs swiþe yfel monn ealra þeawa. 971 Blickl. Hom. 217 Wæs he swiðe ᵹeþungen on his ðeawum. c 1000 ælfric Gen. xxxi. 5 Ic ᵹeseo on eowres fader þeawum, þat he nys swa wel wið me ᵹeworht. c 1200 Ormin 7328, I dærne unnclene þohht & þæw. c 1205 Lay. 6361 Morpidus..Monnene strengest Of maine and of þeauwe. c 1230 Hali Meid. 3 Euch meiden þat haueð meidene þeawes. a 1300 Cursor M. 1947 (Cott.) To doghty thues lok þou þe gif. 1382 Wyclif 1 Cor. xv. 33 Forsoth yuele spechis corumpen (or distroyen) goode thewis (or vertues). 1422 tr. Secreta Secret., Priv. Priv. 211 A man may not fynde in no beste, custume ne thegh, wyche is noght in a man. 1456 Sir G. Haye Law Arms (S.T.S.) 120 The vertues cardinalis..reule of all vertues and gude thewis as kingis. 1508 Dunbar Tua Mariit Wemen 119 Full of eldnyng..and anger, and all euill thewis. 1559 Mirr. Mag., Dk. Clarence xviii, In vertuous thewes. 1590 Spenser F.Q. ii. x. 59 Helena..in all godly thewes and goodly prayse Did far excell. 1805 Southey Madoc ii. xviii, In martial thewes and manly discipline, To train the sons of Owen. |
† b. Without qualification: A good quality or habit; a virtue; courteous or gracious action. Obs.
| c 1205 Lay. 300 Þis child leuede & wel iþei, & þeweas [c 1275 þeuwes] hit luuede. a 1225 Ancr. R. 278 Þes þeau [humility] is alre þeauwene moder. c 1250 Gen. & Ex. 2757 Hu a ȝunge man, at te welle[n] Ðewe and wursipe hem dede. 13.. Cursor M. 20996 (Cott.) A man o mekenes and o theu. 1357 Lay Folks Catech. 406 The third vertu or thew is charite. c 1400 Emare 58 She thawȝth [= tawȝt] hyt curtesye and thewe, Golde and sylke for to sewe. 1575 Gascoigne Notes Instr. in Steele Gl. etc. (Arb.) 37 This poeticall license..turkeneth all things at pleasure, for example, ydone for done..thewes for good partes or good qualities. |
3. pl. Physical good qualities, features, or personal endowments. † a. generally (e.g. the fair features or lineaments of a woman). Obs.
| 1567 Turberv. Ovid's Epist. xv. N iv b, Doost thou thinke..that doltish silly man, The thewes of Helens passing forme, may iudge, or throughly scan? Ibid. xviii. Q vj, I leaue her thewes vntoucht, Wherein she may compare With heauenly peeres, such feature fals On earthlie creatures rare. |
b. The bodily powers or forces of a man (L. vires), might, strength, vigour; in Shakes., bodily proportions, lineaments, or parts, as indicating physical strength; in modern use after Scott, muscular development, associated with sinews, and hence materialized as if = muscles or tendons. Also in sing. and fig.
| 1566 T. Nuce tr. Seneca's Octavia i. iv. B iij b, Ere while thilke wretch recoyleth backe againe, And to my thews for ayde retyres amaine. 1597 Shakes. 2 Hen. IV, iii. ii. 276 Care I for the Limbes, the Thewes, the stature, bulke, and bigge assemblance of a man? giue mee the spirit. 1601 ― Jul. C. i. iii. 81 Romans now Haue Thewes, and Limbes, like to their Ancestors. 1602 ― Ham. i. iii. 12 Nature cressant does not grow alone, In thewes and Bulke. 1791 Cowper Odyss. xvii. 271 He should on bulkier thewes Supported stand [cf. Pope ibid. 264 If any labour those big joints could learn]. 1818 Scott Rob Roy iii, My fellow-traveller, to judge by his thewes and sinews, was a man who might have set danger at defiance. 1843 Lytton Last Bar i. vi, A man who values his kind mainly by their thews and their sinews. 1850 Tennyson In Mem. ciii. 31, I felt the thews of Anakim, The pulses of a Titan's heart. c 1863 E. Dickinson Poems (1955) II. 512 Thigh of Granite—and thew—of Steel. 1873 G. M. Hopkins Jrnls. & Papers (1959) 233 A floating flag is like wind visible and what weeds are in a current; it gives it thew and fires it and bloods it in. 1876 ― Wr. Deutschland xvi, in Poems (1967) 56 He was pitched to his death at a blow, For all his dreadnought breast and braids of thew. 1887 M. E. Braddon Like & Unlike i, Nature has been kinder to your brother in the matter of thew and sinew. 1930 R. Campbell Adamastor 77 A Hercules of matchless thew Whose body is the breath of flowers. 1977 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 15 Sept. 40/3 By ‘language’ he means not the whole body of speech, the thew and sinew of the language..but a precursor's language. |
c. fig. Applied to cords or ropes.
| 1851 Melville The Whale xvi. I. 111 (Descr. of a ship), Bulwarks..garnished..with the long, sharp teeth of the sperm whale,..to fasten her old hempen thews and tendons to. Those thews ran not through base blocks of land wood, but deftly travelled through sheaves of sea-ivory. |
▪ II. † thew, n.2 Obs.
(θjuː)
Also 3–4 theu, 3–6 thewe.
[Known before 1250: etymology obscure; app. from thew v., in sense ‘chastise’; but OE. þ{yacu}wan, þéowan ‘to press, squeeze, compress’ is also a possible source. The forms are identical with contemporary ones of thew n.1]
Name of an instrument or apparatus of punishment ordained, instead of the pillory, for women; often identified with the cucking-stool. Also in comb. thewpenny (cf. burghal-penny).
The med.L. equivalent was collistrigium, i.e. an iron collar compressing and confining the neck.
| 1275 Rot. Hundred. (1818) II. 302/2 (Bassetlaw, Notts) Tempore domini Walteri de Gray [a 1256]..levatum fuit le theu primo in villis ejusdem Archiepiscopi..jam xxx annis elapsis. 1287 Plac. de Quo Warranto (1818) 11/1 Ibi habet tantummodo tumberellum et thewe. Ibid. 11/2 Cum soca et saka..boruhapeny et theupeny. 1290–1 Ipswich Domesday lxxiv. in Blk. Bk. Admir. (Rolls) II. 164 Femmes qe sunt communs tenceresses..seyent eles chastiez par la juyse qe [est] apele le theu. 1364 Lett.-Bk. G. London lf. 137 Consideratum fuit..quod præfata Alicia subhiat judicium cullistr' pro mulieribus inde ordinat' vocata la Thewe [tr. Riley Mem. (1868) 319 That the said Alice should undergo the punishment of the pillory for women ordained, called the thewe.] 1391 Ibid. H. lf. 258 b, Quod eadem Isabella ponatur super le Thewe pro mulieribus ordinat'..ibidem moratura per unam horam diei [tr. ibid. 526, that she should be put upon the thewe, for women ordained, for one hour of the day]. c 1440 Promp. Parv. 490/2 Thewe, or pylory, collistrigium. c 1450 Surtees Misc. (1888) 60 Y⊇ sayd Burgese schall..ordan a pelory and a thew, lawfull and strang. 1483 Cath. Angl. 382/2 A Thewe, tripotheum (A. Collistrigium, et cetera). 15.. in MS. Harl. 2115 lf. 77 Punire per iudicium de Thewe, hoc est ponere eas super Scabellum vocatum Cokestolle. 1533 Surtees Misc. (1888) 34 She shalnot chyde ne flyte,..oppen ridyng of the jebit, or thew, aboute the towne. 1577 Harrison England ii. xix. (1877) i. 310 It is not lawfull for anie subiect..to..set vp furels, tumbrell, thew, or pillorie. 1696 Phillips (ed. 5), Thew, an old Word for a Cucking Stool. |
▪ III. thew, n.3 and v.1
ME. form of theow n. and v.
▪ IV. † thew, v.2 Obs.
In early ME. þæwen, pa. pple. i-þæwed, i-þeuwed.
[app. f. OE. þéaw, thew n.1]
trans. To instruct in morals or manners; to discipline, train, instruct, chastise.
(In quots. a 1225 and c 1305 it may possibly represent or be influenced by OE. þ{yacu}wan, þ{yacu}ȝan, þéowan to press, oppress, repress, threaten, rebuke, which otherwise does not appear to have come down into ME.)
| c 1200 Ormin 6217, & ȝunnc birrþ nimenn mikell gom To þæwenn ȝunnkerr chilldre. a 1225 Ancr. R. 268 (MS. T.) Tu ne schuldest nout tuhten, ne chasten þi meiden uor hire gultes, ne þeawe þine servanz. c 1305 Pilat 57 in E.E.P. (1862) 112 Þo þ'emperour ihurde þat he miȝte þat liþere folc so þewe, He ne huld non so queynte man as he huld þe schrewe. c 1422 Hoccleve Learn to Die 83 And thee the bettre for to thewe, The misterie of my lore y shal the shewe. 1625 Gill Sacr. Philos. iv. 53 Although some Fathers were no better Cosmographers then to think this; yet for the most part they were better thewed [? instructed, or mannered]. |