arch. Forms: 4–5 pl. braches, -ez, 5 bracke, brasche, 6 braach, bratche, 7 bratch, 6–7 brache, 6– brach. [ME. braches pl., prob. a. OF. brachès, brachez, pl. of brachet (med.L. brachētus), dim. of brac (accus. bracon), a common Romanic word (Pr. brac, bracon, It. bracco, Sp. braco, med.L. bracco, -ōnem), a. OHG. bracco (MHG. bracke) a hound hunting by scent. From this pl. braches was app. educed an English sing. brache, brach. (F. braque masc. is a modern form, prob. from It. or MHG.)] A kind of hound that hunts by scent; in later Eng. use, always feminine, and extended to any kind of hound; a bitch-hound.
c. 1340. Gaw. & Gr. Knt., 1142. Braches bayed þerfore & breme noyse maked. Ibid., 1563. The best of his brachez.
1467. Househ. Exp., 558. A ȝonge brasche of halfe ȝere holde.
1490. Caxton, Eneydos, xv. 54. Theyr brackes retches and bloode houndes.
1594. Carew, Huarte’s Exam. Wits, x. (1596), 131. A braach, to hunt and bring the game to his hand.
1596. Nashe, Saffron Walden, T. And so it is with his bratche or bitche-foxe.
1611. Markham, Countr. Content. (1649), 27. When your Bratch is neere whelping … you shall separate her from other hounds.
1686. Gentl. Recreat., II. 27, in Cath. Angl., 39. A brach is a mannerly name for all hound-bitches.
1811. W. Spencer, Poems, 78. Many a brach, and many a hound Attend Llewellyn’s horn.
1848. Kingsley, Saint’s Trag., II. i. 63. We’ll … pamper the brach till we make her a wolf.
1865. H. Kingsley, Hillyars & Burtons, xxiii. Let them take their braches and lie down.
b. fig. A term of abuse. Cf. BITCH.
1670. B. Jonson, Alch., I. i. Away this brach.
a. 1652. Brome, Cov. Gard. weeded, IV. i. Thou greedy Brach.
