Cere v.

Forms: 5–7 sere, 6 ceare, ceere, (cerre), 6–7 sear, 7 seare, 4– cere. [a. F. cirer:—L. cērāre to wax, f. cēra wax.]

  † 1.  trans. To smear or cover with wax, to wax.

c. 1489.  Caxton, Sonnes of Aymon, vii. 173. Mawgys … toke a threde of sylke and cered it well.

1580.  Hollyband, Treas. Fr. Tong, Bougier, to ceare veluet, or any silk cloth.

1601.  Holland, Pliny, II. 425. If the vessells be sered with wax.

  2.  a. To wrap in a cerecloth. † b. To anoint with spices, etc.; also (app.) to embalm (obs.).

c. 1465.  Eng. Chron. (1856), 21. He leet close and sere him in lynne cloth alle save the visage.

1494.  Fabyan, 160. Y^e corps … to be seryd and enoynted with ryche and precyous bawmys.

1555.  Fardle Facions, I. v. 78. Then do thei ceare it [the bodye] ouer with mirrhe and cinamome.

1557.  K. Arthur (W. Copland), V. viii. Ceere them in thre score folde of ceered cloth.

c. 1580.  J. Hooker, Sir P. Carew, in Archæol., XXVIII. 144. His body beinge unbowelled and throughtlye seared, he was then chested.

1608.  Tourneur, Rev. Trag., I. ii. The bowel’d Corps May be seard in.

1790.  Pennant, Tour Scotl., III. 284. The body … was embalmed, cered and wrapped in lead.

  † c.  To shut up (a corpse in a coffin); to seal up (in lead, or the like). Obs.

1525.  Ld. Berners, Froiss., II. ccxxvi[xxii]. 706. His body was enbaumed and scared in lead and couered.

  d.  fig.

1611.  Shaks., Cymb., I. i. 116. Seare vp my embracements from a next, With bonds of death.

1818.  Shelley, Julian & Mad., 437. Let the silent years Be closed and cered over their memory.

  Cere, obs. form of SERE.