Forms: 6– zibeth, 7 zibith, (sebat), 8– zibet. [ad. med.L. zibethum (cf. It. zibello, F. zibet, G. zibeth): see CIVET sb.1] A variant of CIVET sb.1, the animal and the perfume; used distinctively (after Buffon) for the Asiatic species of Viverra, V. zibetha, and the secretion it yields (called also zibethum).
1594. Blundevil, Exerc., Plancius’ Map (1597), 265. Next to her genitories, shee hath a little bagge into the which doth fall the precious greace or humour, which they call Ciuet and Zibeth.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 585. The Zibeth or Sivet-cat.
1669. Address to Hopeful Young Gentry England, 43. You would conceive … that some Chymist had dearly purchas’d their more terrene excrements, out of them to exalt his Occidental zibeth.
1781. Smellie, Buffon’s Nat. Hist. (1791), V. 242. The zibet is probably the civet of Asia, of the East Indies, and of Arabia.
1843. Penny Cycl., XXVI. 406. The marks on the lateral and anterior parts of the neck are very dark in the Zibet.
b. Comb. † zibet-muff, a muff made of civet fur.
1685. Lond. Gaz., No. 2078/4. A Sebat Muff.
