shire 
In the earlier use of the word, shire hud simply answered 
to division. The town of York was parted into seven sudi 
shires. J. R. Green, Conquest of England, p. 230. 
2. Originally, a division of the kingdom of Bug- 
land under the jurisdiction of an ealdormau, 
whose authority was intrusted to the sheriff 
('shire-reeve')> on whom the government ulti- 
mately devolved ; also, in Anglo-Saxon use, in 
general, a district, province, diocese, or parish ; 
in later and present use, one of the larger divi- 
sions into which Great Britain is parted out 
for political and administrative purposes ; a 
county. Some smaller districts in the north of England 
retain the provincial appellation of shire, as Kichmond- 
shire, in the North Riding of Yorkshire, and HallamgAtre, 
or the manor of Hallam, in the West Riding, which is near- 
ly coextensive with the parish of Sheffield. See knight of 
the shire, under knight. 
Of maystres hadde he moo than times ten, 
That were of lawe expert and curious ; . . . 
An able for to helpen al a schire 
In any caas that mighte falle or happe. 
Chaucer, Gen. Prol. to C. T. (ed. Morris), 1. 684. 
The foole expects th' ensuing year 
To be elect high sherif of all the sheire. 
Times' Whistle (E. E. T. 8.), p. 46. 
The name scir [AS. scire] or shire, which marks the divi- 
sion immediately superior to the hundred, merely means 
a subdivision or share of a larger whole, and was early 
used in connexion with an official name to designate the 
territorial sphere appointed to the particular magistracy 
denoted by that name. So the diocese was the bishop's 
scire, and the stewardship of the unjust steward is called 
in the Anglo-Saxon translation of the Gospel his grce/seire. 
We have seen that the original territorial hundreds may 
have been smaller shires. The historical shires or coun- 
ties owe their origin to different causes. 
Stubbi, Const. Hist, 48. 
3f. A shire-moot. See the quotation under 
shire-day The Shires, a belt of English counties run- 
ning in a northeast direction from Devonshire and Hamp- 
shire, the names of which terminate in shire. The phrase 
is also applied in a general way to the midland counties : 
as, he comes from the shires; he has a seat in tin 1 shires. 
shire 2 t, a. and r. An obsolete form of sheer 1 . 
shire-Clerk (shir'klerk), n. In England, an of- 
ficer appointed by the sheriff to assist in keep- 
ing the county court; an under-sheriff ; also, a 
clerk in the old county court who was deputy 
to the under-sheriff. 
shire-day (sher'da), . A day on which the 
shire-moot, or sheriffs court, was held. 
Walter Aslak, ... on the shyre-day of Norffolk, balden 
at Norwiche, the xxviij. day of August, in the seyd secunde 
yeer, beyng there thanne a grete congregacion of poeple by 
cause of the seyd shyre, . . . swiche and so many manaces 
of deth and dismembryng maden. Paston Letters, I. 13. 
shireevet, An obsolete form of sheriff 1 . 
shire-gemot (sher'ge-mot*), . [AS. sciregemot, 
scirgemot: see shire-moot.'] Same as shire-moot. 
Whether the lesser thanes, or inferior proprietors of land, 
were entitled to a place in the national council, as they 
certainly were in the shiregemot, or county-court, is not 
easily to be decided. Hallam, Middle Ages, i. 8. 
shire-ground (sher'ground), it. Territory sub- 
ject to county or sliire administration. 
Except the northern province and some of the central 
districts, all Ireland was shire-ground, and subject to the 
crown [of England], in the thirteenth century. 
Leland, Itinerary, quoted in Hallam 's Const. Hist., xviii. 
shire-host (sher'host), . [< shire 1 + host 1 . 
There is no corresponding AS. compound.] 
The military force of a shire. 
When the shire-host was fairly mustered, the foe was 
back within his camp. 
J. B. Green, Conquest of England, p. 85. 
shire-houset (sher'hous), . [< ME. schirehows; 
< shire 1 + 7iow.se 1 .] A house where the shire- 
moot was held. 
And so John Dam, with helpe of other, gate hym out of 
thescAire-AoM'8, and with niocne labour brought hym unto 
Sporyer Kowe. Patton Letters, I. 180. 
shire-land (sher'land), n. Same as shire-ground. 
A rebellion of two septs in Leinster under Edward VI. 
led to a more complete reduction of their districts, called 
Leix and O'Fally, which in the next reign were made shire- 
land, by the names of King's and Queen's county. 
Hallam, Const. Hist, xviii. 
shireman (sher'man), n. ; pi. shiremen (-men). 
[Also dial, shereman; < ME. shireman (> ML. 
schirma>ms),<. AS. scireman. scirman (also scires- 
man), < scire, shire, + man, man.] 1. A sheriff. 
Compare earl. 
The shire already has its shireman or shire-reeve. 
J. It. Green, Conquest of England, p. 223. 
2. A man belonging to "the shires" (which see, 
under shire). 
Shire-man. Any man who had not the good fortune to 
be born in one of the sister counties, or in Essex. He is a 
sort of foreigner to us ; and to our ears, which are acutely 
sensible of any violation of the beauty of our phraseology, 
and the music of our pronunciation, his speech soon be- 
wrays him. " Aye, I knew he must be a there-man by his 
tongue." Forby, p. 296. llalli'mll. 
5578 
shire-moot (sher'mot), w. [Also sliiremotc; < 
AS. si'iri-i/ciiiiil. ai-iriji'iiii'it. also sciircsniitt (> 
ML. si'i/ri'-iiioliiM), shire-moot, < .id re, shire. + 
i/niidt, meeting: seeshire 1 and moot 1 . Cf.folk- 
mnot, witena-gemot.] Formerly, in England, a 
court or assembly of the county held periodi- 
cally by the sheriff along with the bishop of 
the diocese, and with the ealdorman in shires 
that had ealdormen. 
The presence of the ealdorman and the bishop, who 
legally sat with him [the sheriff] hi the Mre-moot, and 
whose presence recalled the folk-moot from which it 
sprang, would necessarily be rare and irregular, while 
the reeve was bound to attend : and the result of this is 
seen in the way in which the shire-moot soon became known 
simply as the sheriff's court. 
J. K. Green, Conquest of England, p. 230. 
The shiremoot, like the hundredmoot, was competent 
to declare folkright in every suit, but its relation to the 
lower court was not, properly speaking, an appellate juris- 
diction. Its function was to secure to the suitor the right 
which he had failed to obtain in the hundred. 
Stubbs, Const. Hist, 60. 
shire-reevet (sher'rev), n. [See sheriff 1 .] A 
sheriff. 
shire-town (shir'toun), . The chief town of 
a shire; a county town. 
shire-wickt (sher'wik), . A shire ; a county. 
Holland. 
shirk (sherk), v. [More prop, sherk ; appar. the 
same as shark (cf . clerk aud dark, ME. dcrk and 
E. dark 1 ): see shark?.] I. intrans. If. To 
practise mean or artful tricks ; live by one's 
wits; shark. 
He [Archbishop Laud] might have spent his time much 
better . . . than thus sherking and raking in the tobacco- 
shops. State Trials (1640), H. Orimstone. 
2. To avoid unfairly or meanly the perform- 
ance of some labor or duty. 
One of the cities shirked from the league. 
Byron, To Murray, Sept. 7, 1820. 
There was little idling and no shirking in his school. 
H. B. Storn, Oldtown, p. 425. 
To shirk off, to sneak away. [Colloq.] 
II. trans. It. To procure by mean tricks; 
shark. /'J>. Diet. 2. To avoid or get off 
from unfairly or meanly ; slink away from : as, 
to shirk responsibility. [Colloq.] 
They would roar out instances of his . . . shirking some 
encounter with a lout half his own size. 
T. Hughes, Tom Brown at Eugby, i. 8. 
shirk (sherk), w. [See shirk, v., and shark 2 , .] 
It. One who lives by shifts or tricks. See 
shark'*. 2. One who seeks to avoid duty. 
shirker (sher'ker), n. [< shirk + -er 1 .] One 
who shirks duty or danger. 
A faint-hearted shirker of responsibilities. 
Cornhill Mag., II. 109. 
shirky (sher'ki), a. [< shirk + -y 1 .] Disposed 
to shirk; characterized by shirking. Imp. 
Diet. 
shirl 1 (sherl), r. and a. An obsolete or dialec- 
tal form of shrill. 
shirl 2 (sherl), v. t. [Also shurl ; prop, 'sherl, 
a freq. of shear 1 .] To cut with shears. Halli- 
icell. [Prov. Eng.] 
shirl 3 (sherl), r. i. [Perhaps prop. *sherl, freq. 
of sheer 1 ; otherwise due to shirl 2 .] 1. To slide. 
My young ones lament that they can have no more 
shirting in the lake : a motion something between skating 
and sliding, aud originating in the iron clogs. 
Southey, Letters, 1826. 
2. To romp about rudely. Halliicell. 
[Prov. Eng. in both uses.] 
shirl 4 (sheri), n. [< G. schirl, for schorl : see 
schorl, shorl.] Schorl. [Rare.] 
shirly (sher'li), adv. An obsolete or dialectal 
form of shrilly. 
shirpt, *' ' [Imitative. Cf. chirp 1 .] To puff 
with the mouth in scorn. 
Du/a, the dispisyng Waste of the mouthe that we call 
shirpyng. Thomas, Italian Diet. (HaUiweU.) 
shirr, shir (sher), v. t. [Origin obscure ; hardly 
found in literature or old records; perhaps a 
dial, form (prop. *sher) and use of sheer 2 , i:] 
1 . To pucker or draw up (a fabric or a part of a 
fabric) by means of parallel gathering-threads : 
as, to shirr an apron. 2. In cookery, to poach 
(eggs) in cream instead of water. 
shirr, shir (sher), w. [< shinf, i:] 1. A pucker- 
ing or fulling produced in a fabric by means 
of parallel gathering-threads. 2. One of the 
threads of india-rubber woven into cloth or rib- 
bon to make it elastic. 
shirred (sherd), p. a. 1 . (a) Puckered or gather- 
ed, as by shirring : as, a shirred bonnet. [U. S.] 
(1) Having india-rubber or elastic cords woven 
in the texture, so as to produce shirring. 
[Eng.] 2. In cookery, poached in cream : said 
of eggs. 
shirt-frill 
shirrevet, An earlier form of sin '''.//' 
shirring (shi'r'inj;), n. [Verbal n. of shirr, i 1 .] 
1. Decorative needlework done by gathering 
the stuff in very small gathers, and holding it 
at more than one point, either by stitching, or 
by cords which pass through it and gather it 
more or less closely at pleasure. 2. Manu- 
factured webbing, and the like, in which an 
elastic cord or thread gives the effect described 
above. Also called elastic. 
shining-string (sher'ing-string), n. A string 
or cord passed between the two thicknesses of 
a double shirred fabric, so as to make the small 
gathers closer or looser at pleasure. Several 
such cords are put in side by side. 
shirt (shert), H. [< ME. sliirte, sehirte, schyrt, 
xcliirt, .ilirrte, sscrte, shurte, scurte, scorte, either 
< AS. 'sceorte or *scijrte (not found), or an as- 
sibilated form, due to association with the re- 
lated adj. short (< AS. sceort), of skirt, nkirte, < 
Icel. skyrta, a shirt, a kind of kirtle, = Sw. 
skjorta, skort = Dan. skjorte, a shirt, skjiirt, a 
petticoat, = D. schort = MLG. schortc = MHG. 
schu)-;, G. schurz, schilrze, an apron; from the 
adj., AS. sceort = OHG. scurz, short (cf. Icel. 
skortr, shortness) : see short. Doublet of skirt.] 
1. A garment, formerly the chief under-garmeut 
of both sexes. Now the name is given to a garment 
worn only by men and a similar garment worn by infants. 
It has many forms. In western Europe and the United 
States, the shirt ordinarily worn by men is of cotton, with 
linen bosom, wristbands, and collar prepared for stiffen- 
ing with starch, the collar and wristbands being usually 
separate and adjustable. Flannel and knitted worsted 
shirts or under-shirts are also woni. 
The Emperour a-non 
A-lihte a-doun and bis clothus of caste euerichon, 
Anon to his schurte. Holy Hood (E. E. T. S.), p. 55. 
"You must wear my husband's linen, which, I dare say, 
is not so fine as yours." "Pish, my dear ; my shirts are 
good shirts enough for any Christian," cries the Colonel. 
Thackeray, Virginians, xxii. 
2t. The amnion, or some part of it. 
Ayneliere, the inmost of the three membranes which en- 
wrap a womb-lodged infant ; called by some midwives the 
coif or biggin of the child ; by others, the childs shirt. 
Cotgrave. 
3. In a blast-furnace, an interior lining A 
boiled Shirt, a white or linen shirt : so called in allusion 
to the laundrying of it [Slang.] 
There was a considerable inquiry for "store clothes," a 
hopeless overhauling of old and disused raiment, and a 
general demand for boiled shirts and the barber. 
Bret llarte, Fool of Five Forks. 
Bloody shirt, a blood-stained shirt, as the symbol or to- 
ken of murder or outrage. Hence, "to wave the bloody 
shirt" is to bring to the attention or recall to mind, in 
order to arouse indignation or resentment, the murders 
or outrages committed by persons belonging to a party, 
for party advantage or as a result of party passion : spe- 
cifically used in the United States with reference to 
such appeals, often regarded as demagogic and insincere, 
made by Northern politicians with reference to murders 
or outrages committed in the South during the period of 
reconstruction and later (see Kuklux Klan), or to the civil 
war. 
Palladius who . . . was acquainted with stratagems 
invented . . . that all the men there should dress them- 
selves like the poorest sort of the people in Arcadia, hav- 
ing no banners but bloody shirts hanged upon long staves, 
with some bad bagpipes instead of drum and fife. 
Sir P. Sidney, Arcadia, i. 
The sacred duty of pursuing the assassins of Othman 
was the engine and pretence of his [Moawiyah's] ambition. 
The bloody shirt of the martyr was exposed in the mosch 
of Damascus. 
Gibbon, Decline and Fall (ed. Smith, 1866), VI. 277. 
He [M. Leon Foucher, reviewing Guizot's translation of 
Sparks's Washington] adds : " It is by spreading out the 
miseries of the workmen, the bloody shirt of some victim, 
the humiliation of all, that the people are excited to take 
arms." . . . He then proceeds to state, apparently as a 
corollary of what may be called his bloody-shirt principle, 
that our Revolution was not popular with what he terms 
the inferior classes. . . . But most assuredly the Americans 
did not want a visible signal to push them on ; and he who 
should have displayed a bloody shirt for that purpose 
would have been followed by the contempt of the specta- 
tors, and saluted with stones by every idle boy in the streets. 
L. Cass, France, its King, etc., p. 44. 
Hair shirt. SeeAafri. 
shirt (shert), r. t. [< shirt, n.] To clothe with 
a shirt ; hence, by extension, to clothe ; cover. 
Ah, for so many souls, as but this morn 
Were clothed with flesh, and warmed with vital blood, 
But naked now, or skirted but with air ! 
Dryden, King Arthur, ii. 1. 
shirt-buttons (shert'buf'nz), n. A kind of 
chickweed, Stellaria Holostea, with conspicuous 
white flowers. [Prov. Eng.] 
Shirt-frame (shert'fram), . A machine for 
knitting shirts or guernseys. E. H. Knight. 
shirt-frill (shert'fril), . A frill of fine cam- 
bric or lawn, worn by men on the breast of the 
shirt a fashion of the early part of the nine- 
teenth century. 
