Also 6 chynk(e, chincke, 7 chinke. [This and its verb, CHINK v.2, are known only from the 16th c. There is nothing similar in Teutonic or Romanic.
In sense, chink is exactly equivalent to the earlier word CHINE (sb.1), and indeed its earliest known occurrence is in Berthelet’s ed. of a work, where it has been substituted for chine, chynne of earlier MSS. and edd. And, although ‘chynes and chynkes’ occurs in 1545–64, it may be said that, generally, chink took the place of chine, between 1550 and 1580. It thus looks like a new formation on chine; but no satisfactory account of its origin can at present be offered. If chinch, CHINSE, is, as it appears to be, a variant of the verb, the whole may have to be referred to an earlier date.
Professor Skeat thinks it ‘formed with an added k expressive of ‘diminution’; but examples of this process in 15–16th c. are not known.
Wedgwood would identify it with CHINK3, with the root notion of a sharp shrill sound, as in the chink of metal, and thence derive the sense of sudden fissure or fracture accompanied by such a sound. He compares the development of CRACK, ‘sharp report’ and then ‘fissure,’ and of other words, in which actions are instinctively expressed by their associated sounds (Cf. e.g., bang, bomb, bum, chap, clap, pop.) But the historical data are too scanty to establish this.]
1. A fissure caused by splitting; a cleft, rift or crack; a crevice, gap. = CHINE sb.1 1, 2.
[1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., VIII. xl. (Tollem. MS.). Also in chines, holes and dennes of þe erþe.
c. 1450. MS. Bodl. 3738 VIII. xxviii., and 1495 W. de W. ibid., In chynnes holes and dennes.]
1535. ed. Berthelet, VIII. xl. The chinkes, holes and dennes of the erthe.
1545. Raynold, Byrth Mankynde, Hh j. Betwene the chines and gynks [ed. 1564 chynes and chynkes] of closely ioynyd bourdes.
1577. B. Googe, Heresbach’s Husb., II. (1586), 77. See it be … not ful of chincks or cleftes, that the Sunne burne not the tender rootes.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 585. A city swallowed vp by a wide chinke and opening of the earth.
1691. Ray, Creation, I. (1704), 87. The Water descending … into Chinks and Veins.
1697. Dryden, Virg. Georg., III. 656. The chapt Earth is furrow’d o’er with Chinks.
1791. Smeaton, Edystone L. (1793), § 26. An iron chain … fast jambed into a chink of the rock.
1865. Geikie, Scen. & Geol. Scot., viii. 229. The low cliff … is rent into endless chinks and clefts.
b. A fissure or crack in the skin; a chap.
1597. Gerard, Herbal, I. xl. 60. The chappes and chinkes of the hands.
1748. trans. Vegetius’ Distemp. Horses, 196. A sore like a Chap or Chink.
c. fig.
1664. H. More, Myst. Iniq., ix. 28. The eye of an Angel could never spie out any such chink or least crack in Religious worship.
1860. Emerson, Cond. Life, Power, Wks. (Bohn), II. 329. There is no chink or crevice in which it [power] is not lodged.
2. A long and narrow aperture through the depth or thickness of an object; a slit, an opening in a joint between boards, etc.
1552. Huloet, Chinck, clyft, cranny, or creues of earth, stone or woode, thorowe the whiche a man maye loke.
1579. Spenser, Sheph. Cal., May. Privily he peeped out through a chinck.
1599. Sandys, Europæ Spec. (1632), 139. The box of devotion, with some poore begging Crucifix lightly before it, and two tapers on each side to see the chinke to put money in.
1656. Cowley, Reason, vi. in Misc., 28.
| Though Reason cannot through Faith Myst’eries see, | |
| It sees that There and such they bee; | |
| Leads to Heav’ens Door, and there does humbly keep, | |
| And there through Chinks and Key-holes peep. |
1703. Maundrell, Journ. Jerus. (1732), 96. Fire was seen, or imagin’d to appear, thro’ some chinks of the door.
1839–47. Todd, Cycl. Anat., III. 111/2. The length of the chink of the glottis is very variable.
1862. E. A. Parkes, Pract. Hygiene (ed. 3), 127. Chinks and openings produced by imperfect carpentry.
fig. 1831. Landor, Andrea of Hungary, Wks. 1846, II. 540. That is the chink of time they all drop through.
