Forms: 3 nage-, 6–9 nache-, 5 hach-, 9 aitch-, H-, each-bone. And corruptly 6 ise-, 7 ice-, 8 ize-, 9 ische-, ash-, edge-bone. [As shown by Mr. H. Nicol (Phil. Soc. 3 May 1878) orig. nache- or nage-bone, bone of the buttock, a. OFr. nache, nage:—late L. *natica, prop. adj. f. nati-s buttock; see NACHE. The initial n being lost by coalescence with a (as in a nadder, an adder) a nache, an ache has been phonetically narrowed to aitch, each, corrupted as ash, ische, and falsely refashioned as H-, ice-, edge-bone.] The bone of the buttock or rump; the cut of beef lying over this bone.
[c. 1300. Langtoft’s Chron., in Pol. Songs, 295. The fote-folke Puth the Scotes in the polke, and nakned their nages.
1523. Fitzherbert, Husb., § 57. Upon the hucbone and the nache by the tayle.
1784–1815. A. Young, Ann. Agric. (in Britten 97). The catch or point of the rump … The nache in some writers; also the tail-points by others.]
1486. Bk. St. Albans, f 3 b. Kerue vp the flesh ther vp to the hach-boon.
1576. Exp. Queens table, in Nichols’s Progr., II. 8. Ise-bones … 2 st. … 2d.
1691. Ray, S. E. Country Wds., Ice-bone, a rump of beef [Norf.].
1703. Thoresby, Lett. to Ray, Ize-bone, the huckle-bone, the coxa [Yorksh.].
c. 1818. Yng. Woman’s Compan. The hind quarter contains the sirloin … and the isch, each, or ash-bone.
1822. Kitchiner, Cook’s Oracle, 151. H-Bone of Beef. (Note. In Mrs. Mason’s Ladies Assistant [1773] this joint is called ‘Haunch-bone’; in Henderson’s Cookery, ‘Edge-bone’; in Domestic Management [1810] ‘Aitch-bone’; in Reynold’s Cookery, ‘Ische-bone’; in Mrs. Lydia Fisher’s Prudent Housewife, ‘Ach-bone’; in Mrs. M’Iver’s Cookery, ‘Hook-bone.’ We have also seen it spelt ‘Each-bone,’ and ‘Ridge-bone,’ and we have also heard it called ‘Natch-bone.’)
1828. Carr, Craven Gloss., Nache-bone.
1873. E. Smith, Foods, 48. The proportion of bone … is the greatest in the head, shins, and legs and the aitch bone.
1876. Echo, 6 Dec., 1/3. Present Prices:—Beef … Aitch-bone 71/2d. per lb.
