gratten south. dial.
(ˈgrætən)
Also 6–8 grotten, 8 grotton, 9 grattan, 7– gratton.
[? Repr. OE. *grǽd-t{uacu}n, f. grǽd ‘ulva’, coarse grass (cf. greeds) + t{uacu}n enclosure (see town).]
A stubble-field, stubble. Also, the after-grass growing in the stubble.
| 1572 Googe Heresbach's Husb. iii. (1577) 149 b [Young pigs] may well feed vpon strawe, and grottens. 1625 Markham Inrichment Weald of Kent 10 Vpon that fallow or Gratten, (as we call it,) you shall doe well to sow it with Pease. 1674 Ray S. & E.C. Words 67 A Gratton..Stubble. Kent. 1675 in Phil. Trans. X. 295 The grass will be so good immediately after Tillage, that we commonly mow it the first year: This is call'd mowing of gratten. 1736 Pegge Kenticisms (E.D.S.), Grotten. 1750 Ellis Mod. Husbandm. V. i. xxii. 101 Now turn your Cows and Hogs into your enclosed Stubble-fields as the first Cattle proper for this Purpose, or, as some call them, into Grattons and Eddishes. 1789 Trans. Soc. Arts I. 121 Two acres Wheat Gratten. 1860 Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc. XXI. ii. 385 A barley-stubble, or gratten, of the required dimensions. 1884 R. Bridges Return of Ulysses ii. 451 Yet mayst thou see on me The sign of what I have been, and I think Still from the gratten one may guess the grain. |