Now dial. Also 6 -specht, 7 -speight, -spight. [f. WOOD sb.1 + SPEIGHT.] A woodpecker; esp. the Green Woodpecker, Gecinus viridis.
1555. Gesner, Hist. Anim., III. Avium, 680. Primum pici genus Angli spechtam & wodspechtam … nominant.
1601. Holland, Pliny, XXVII. x. II. 282. The roots must bee digged up in the night season, for feare that the Wood-speight or Hickway should see them: for in the day time the said bird would flie in their faces that carie it away, and be ready to job out their eyes.
1606. N. B[axter], Sydney’s Ourania, H 2. The coloured Woodspite runs along the trees.
1618. Reyce, Brev. Suffolk (1902), 45. Divers others, whose notes I cannott commend vnto you, as the Cookcow, the Jay, the wood spight, the owle.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist., V. 249. The Green Wood-spite or Wood-pecker is called the Rain-Fowl in some parts of the country.
1885. Swainson, Prov. Names Birds, 99. Green Woodpecker…. Wood spite (Norfolk). Wood spack (Norfolk; Suffolk).
