▪ I. † dess, n.1 Obs.
Also desse.
[a. OF. deis, dais, dais.]
1. Obs. form of dais.
2. A desk.
| 1552 Huloet, Desse or lecturne to lay a boke on, ambonus. 1596 Spenser F.Q. iv. x. 50 A bevie of fayre damzels..Wayting when as the Antheme should be sung on hye. The first of them did seeme of ryper yeares..And next to her sate goodly Shamefastnesse, Ne ever durst her eyes from ground upreare, Ne ever once did looke up from her desse. |
▪ II. dess, n.2 Sc. and north. dial.
(dɛs)
Also dass.
[Of doubtful origin: cf. Icel. des in hey-des hay-rick; but the sense ‘layer’ suggests that the word is identical with prec. (OF. deis, dais raised platform or floor.)]
1. A stratum, a layer.
| 1674–91 Ray N.C. Words 139 First they take the mine picked from the Desse or Rock. 1795 Statist. Acc. Stirlings. XV. 327 (Jam.) Then 15 strata of muirstone rise above each other to the summit of the Fells..in the face of the braes, they go by the name of dasses or gerrocks. 1818 Hogg Brownie of B. II. 61 (Jam.) They soon reached a little dass in the middle of the linn, or what an Englishman would call a small landing-place. 1876 Robinson Whitby Gloss., Dess, a layer of piled substances; a course in a building. ‘Laid up in desses’, laid tier upon tier. 1891 Atkinson Moorland Parish 55 He'd getten a haill dess o' shaffs..and was rife for another dess. |
2. (See quots.)
| 1788 Marshall Provincialisms of E. Yorksh. in Rural Economy (E.D.S.), Dess, a cut of hay. 1875 Lancash. Gloss., Dess (Fylde distr.), a pile, applied to straw. 1878 Cumbrld. Gloss., Dess, a pile, a heap; a truss of hay. |
▪ III. dess, v. north. dial.
[f. dess n.2]
1. trans. To arrange in a layer or layers; to pile up in layers.
| 1641 Best Farm. Bks. (Surtees) 139 The usuall way for dessinge of strawe. 1674–91 Ray N.C. Words 20 Desse, to lay close together: to desse Wool, Straw, &c. 1787 Grose Prov. Gloss., Desse,..in Cumb., to put in order. 1788 Marshall Provincialisms of E. Yorksh., Dess up, to pile up neatly. 1851 Cumbrld. Gloss., Dess, to lay carefully together. 1855 Robinson Whitby Gloss., Dess'd up, piled up. |
2. To cut (a section of hay) from a stack.
| 1787 Grose Prov. Gloss. 1847–78 in Halliwell. |
3. intr. To work in a stratum or strata; to hew out particular strata or layers from the face of a cliff.
| 1876 Robinson Whitby Gloss. s.v., ‘They're dessing for jet’, i.e. hacking it out of the layers or desses, when it occurs..on the face of the cliff. 1882 Good Cheer 61 You knew he was getting jet, dessing in Helabeck Bight yonder. |