[f. prec. Cf. Fr. fagoter.]
1. trans. To make into a faggot or faggots; to bind up in or as in a faggot. Also, To faggot up.
1598. Florio, Affascinare … to fagot.
1641. J. Jackson, True Evang. T., I. 33. Hermes Prefect of the City, with his Wife, Children, and whole family; which amounted to the number of 1250. persons, who were all fagotted together, to make one great bone-fire.
1649. Blithe, Eng. Improv. Impr. (1652), 162. All their brush being faggotted into the Faggot.
1669. Flavel, Husbandry Spiritualised (1832), 210. Growing amongst them that shall shortly be cut down and faggoted up for hell.
1721. R. Keith, trans. T. à Kempis’ Solil. Soul, ii. 132. Then shall they be faggotted together in Bundles for the Fire, who were here Companions in Drunkenness.
1786. Cowper, Letter, 8 May. The dunce, misapprehending the order, cut down and faggoted up the whole grove, leaving neither tree, bush, nor twig.
1857. Landor (title), Dry Sticks Fagoted.
b. transf. and fig.
1605. Bacon, Adv. Learn., II. viii. § 5. Titles packed and fagotted vp together.
1681. Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel, II. 418.
| He was too warm on Picking-work to dwell, | |
| But Faggotted his Notions as they fell, | |
| And if they Rhim’d and Rattl’d, all was well. |
a. 1722. Lisle, Husb. (1752), 173. The parts of the rath-ripe seeds are not corded, braced, or faggotted together with so strong an union or texture as the late-ripe seeds.
1784. Hare, Vict. Faith, 38. Things essentially and substantially different, bundled and fagoted together for the occasion.
1882. T. Mozley, Remin., I. lv. 352. He [Newman] fagoted Hampden’s pamphlet on ‘Religious Dissent’ with several other scandals, as he deemed them, in the ‘Foundations of the Faith Assailed.’
† c. To bind (persons) in couples; also, to bind hand and foot. Obs.
1607. G. Wilkins, Miseries Inforced Marriage, v. Then [they] fagotted you and the fool, your man, back to back.
1725. New Cant. Dict. Faggot, to bind Hand and Foot.
1721–1800. in Bailey.
2. Metall. To fasten together bars or rods of iron preparatory to reheating and welding.
1861. W. Fairbairn, Iron, vi. 102–3. These [puddle bars] are cut up and piled regularly together or faggotted, and brought to a welding heat in the heating or balling furnace.
1879. Cassell’s Techn. Educ., IV. 175/1. The axles should be made of the best scrap iron fagoted.
3. To set (a person) on the faggots preparatory to burning; lit. and fig. rare.
1543. Joye, Coufut. Winchester, 24. Fagetting, burninge and slaying the true professours … of gods holy word.
18[?]. Landor, Wks. (1868), II. 156. The poet is staked and faggoted by his surrounding brethren.
4. intr. To make or bind faggots.
1874. T. Hardy, Madding Crowd, II. x. 107–8. A lone hazel copse, wherein heaps of white chips strewn upon the leafy ground showed that woodmen had been faggoting and making hurdles during the day.
1879. R. Jefferies, Wild Life in a Southern County, 76. After they have finished faggoting, the women rake up the fragments for their cottage fires.
† b. To carry or wear a faggot in token of recantation; to recant. Obs.
1535. Shaxton, in Strype, Eccl. Mem., I. App. lxi. 149. Making onely his reformation in words; & neither faggoting; nor to his utter shame & confusion, any open revocation.
5. (See quot.)
1880. E. Cornw. Gloss., Faggot … a man who in the wrestling ring, sells his back, is said to faggot.
