Forms: 5–6 crele, creill(e, 5 crelle, 6 creil, krele, kreil, 7 creele, (8 crail), 8– creel. [Originally northern, and chiefly Scotch; etymology uncertain.
The OIr. criol chest, coffer, has been compared: but the vowel of creel appears to be not ī, but ē or ei, ai. OF. greílle:—L. crāticula fine hurdle-work, may have had a variant *creille.]
1. A large wicker basket; formerly applied to the large deep baskets, coupled in pairs across the backs of horses, for the transport of goods; now applied to a basket used for the transport of fish and borne upon the back, to a potato-basket, and the like.
c. 1425. Wyntoun, Cron., VIII. xxxviii. 51. A payr of Coil Crelis.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 101. Crelle, baskett or lepe, cartallus, sporta.
c. 1475. Rauf Coilȝear, 367. He kest twa Creillis on ane Capill, with Coillis anew.
1508. Dunbar, Flyting w. Kennedie, 229. Cager aviris castis bayth coillis and creilis.
1560. Rolland, Crt. Venus, III. 595. Ȝe him hang ouir ȝour wallis in a creill.
1564. Wills & Inv. N. C. (Surtees), 224. A basket and iij kreles.
1610. Healey, St. Aug. Citie of God, 251. There was also the Vanne which is otherwise called the Creele.
c. 1730. Burt, Lett. N. Scotl. (1818), I. 330. His horse laden with creels, or small panniers.
1806. Gazetteer Scot. (ed. 2), 194. Fishermen, whose wives carry the fish in wicker-baskets, or creels to Edinburgh.
1811. Willan, W. Riding Gloss. (E. D. S.), Creel, two semi-circular wicker baskets joined by cords which admit of their closing to hold hay. A man having the creel strapped over his shoulders, conveys provender to sheep.
1860. G. H. K., Vac. Tour, 121. When the father of the last Lord Reay … changed his residence … his son was put into a creel on one side of a pony, and counterbalanced by his younger brother, the admiral, in another.
1869–78. in Dial. Glossaries of Cumberland, Lonsdale, Swaledale, Whitby, Holderness, N. W. Linc.
1884. Q. Victoria, More Leaves, 206. An old fishwife, with her creel on her back,… began waving a handkerchief, and almost dancing.
b. A modern term for an angler’s fishing-basket.
1842. Proc. Berw. Nat. Club, II. 4. Ere the Creel was half stocked.
1874. C. S. Keene, Lett., in Life (1892), 159. I hope you had a good time with rod and creel.
1884. W. C. Smith, Kildrostan, I. i. 227. It iss not every fish you hook that comes to the creel.
2. A contrivance made of wickerwork used as a trap for catching fish, lobsters, etc.
1457. Sc. Acts Jas. II. (1597), § 87. That na man in smolt time set veschelles, creilles, weires, or ony vther ingine to let the smoltes to goe to the Sea.
1533–4. Act 25 Hen. VIII., c. 7. No person shal take in any lepe, hiue, crele … fier, or any other engine … the yonge frie … of any kinde of salmon.
1536. Bellenden, Cron. Scot. (1821), I. p. xxxiv. The peple makis ane lang mand, narrow halsit, and wyid mouthit … als sone as the see ebbis, the fische ar tane dry in the crelis.
1596. Dalrymple, trans. Leslie’s Hist. Scot., 42. Nocht sa mekle fishe thay with nettis, as with skepis, or long kreilis win with wickeris in the form of a hose.
1758. Binnell, Descr. Thames, 111. With any Nets, Trammel, Keep, Wore, Creel, or other Device.
1775. Adair, Amer. Ind., 403. Catching fish in long crails, made with canes and hiccory splinters, tapering to a point.
3. To coup the creels: in various fig. uses; to fall or tumble over; ‘to tumble heels over head, to die’ (Jamieson); to meet with a mishap. In a creel: in a state of temporary mental aberration.
1715. Ramsay, Christ’s Kirk Gr., II. xvii. Whan he was strute twa sturdy chiels … Held up frae cowping o’ the creels The liquid logic scholer.
1785. Burns, To William Simpson, iii. My senses wad be in a creel, Should I but dare a hope to speel, Wi’ Allan, or wi’ Gilbertfield.
1816. Scott, Old Mort., vi. ‘The laddie’s in a creel!’ exclaimed his uncle. Ibid. (1818), Rob Roy, xx. If folk … wad needs be couping the creels ower through-stanes.
a. 1835. Hogg, Tales & Sk., III. 206. If you should … coup the creels just now … it would be out of the power of man to get you to a Christian burial.
1871. C. Gibbon, Lack of Gold, xvii. ‘The lassie’s head’s in a creel,’ cried Susan.
4. attrib. and Comb., as creel-hawking, -pig; creel-like adv.; creel-house, a house or hut with the walls made of wickerwork covered with clay; creel-man, a man who transports goods in creels.
1865. J. G. Bertram, Harvest of Sea (1873), 310. The system of merchandise followed by the fishwives in the old days of *creel-hawking.
1876. Robinson, Whitby Gloss., *Creel-house, a wicker hut with a sodded roof.
1878. Mackintosh, Hist. Civiliz. Scot., I. Introd. 134. Till recently crell houses were used in some parts of the Highlands.
1638–9. in Maidment, Sc. Pasquils (1868), 66. He … *creel lyke lives in the fyre of contentione.
1883. J. Beath, Bishopshire Lilts, 14. Stridelegs on the *creelman’s ass.
1880. Antrim & Down Gloss., *Creel-pig, a young pig, such as is taken to market in a creel or basket.
