sb. Also 9 craich. [a. Gaelic and Irish creach plunder, pillage.]
1. An incursion for plunder (in Ireland and the Highlands of Scotland); a raid, foray.
1814. Scott, Wav., xv. (heading), A Creagh, and its consequences. note, A creagh was an incursion for plunder, termed on the Borders a raid.
1845. New Statist. Acc. Scot., XV. 198. A border parish was exposed to sudden inroads and craichs.
1888. Blackw. Mag., April, 535/1. Blackmailing was in full force, and was found to be a cheap form of insurance by the landowners and farmers who lay exposed to the creaghs.
2. Booty, prey.
1818. Scott, Hrt. Midl., xlix. The cattle were in the act of being driven off, when Butler … rescued the creagh.
1873. Burton, Hist. Scot., VI. lxv. 22. Large ‘creachs’ of prey were driven by the Highlanders.
Hence Creagh v. trans., to raid, plunder.
1883. Sat. Rev., LV. 464/2. Those who are ‘creaghed.’
1884. Mary Hickson, Irel. in 17th C., I. Introd. 14. The wild creaghting life of Ulster was to be changed into a life of prosperous agricultural and commercial industry.
