Forms: 1–2 assa, 2–8 asse, 3– ass (3–5 as, 3 has, 4–5 a nasse). Pl. 4– asses: 1 assan, 2–4 assen, 3–4 asse (southern). [OE. assa m. has no exact analogue in the cognate langs. OE. had also èsol, app. for èsel, èsil, the common Teut. form, = OS. and OHG. esil (mod.G. esel, Du. ezel), Goth. asilus, like the Celtic and Slav. names (OIrish asal, Lith. asilas, OSlav. osl:—*osilu-) evidently ad. L. asinus. From the Celtic was the Old Northumbrian asal, assal, assald, the only form in Lindisf. Gospels (occurs 10 times). Of the latter, assa was perh. a diminutive, formed like the dim. proper names Ceadda, Ælla, Offa, etc., which at length displaced the earlier èsol. Assa had also fem. assen, on the type of fyxen, wylfen, ælfen, which did not survive into ME., where he-asse, she-asse, occur already in Wyclif. Jack-ass, Jenny-ass are modern familiar appellations.
The reputed OE. fem. asse seems to be an error founded on assan folan in which ass is no more fem. than are lion, tiger, in lion’s whelp, tiger’s cub. The ON. asna f., asni m. appear to be independent late adaptations of L. asina, asinus, not actually connected with the OE. The Celtic, Teut. and Slavonic can hardly have been independent adoptions of the L.: the Slav. was apparently taken through Teutonic: was the latter through Celtic? The Ass had no original Aryan name: L. asinus, Gr. ὄνος (? = ὄσνος), were prob. of Semitic origin: cf. Heb. āthōn, she-ass.]
1. A well-known quadruped of the horse kind, distinguished from the horse by its smaller size, long ears, tuft at end of tail, and black stripe across the shoulders. Found wild in western and southwestern Asia, where it has been used from the earliest ages as a beast of burden, and whence, in later times, it appears to have been introduced as a domestic animal into Europe.
(In familiar use, the name ass is now to a great extent superseded by donkey (in Scotland cuddie); but ass is always used in the language of Scripture, Natural History, proverb and fable; also, in ordinary use, in Ireland.)
c. 1000. Ælfric, Numb. xxii. 23. Se assa ʓeseah ðone engel.
c. 1000. Ags. Gosp., Matt. xxi. 2. Sona finde ʓyt ane assene ʓetiʓʓede, and hyre folan mid hyre. Ibid., John xii. 15. Uppan assan folan sittende.
c. 1175. Lamb. Hom., 3. Heo nomen þe asse and here colt.
1297. R. Glouc., 404. Hii ete Her hors … and hassen ar hii lete.
c. 1325. Cœur de L., 6453. Fyftene hundryd asse Bar wyn and oyle.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 3152. Þe child he kest a-pon an ass. Ibid., 6156. Sheepe ne cow ox ne as.
a. 1300. E. E. Psalter civ. 11. Wilde asses in þar þrist sal abide.
1382. Wyclif, Gen. xlv. 23. Ten hee assis … and as feele she assis [1388 Ten male assis … and so many femal assis].
c. 1386. Chaucer, Wife’s Prol., 285. Assen, oxen, and houndes.
c. 1400. Apol. Loll., 97. Þe oxe knowiþ his weldar, and þe as þe crib of his lord.
1601. Shaks., Jul. C., IV. i. 21. He shall but beare them, as the Asse beares Gold.
1617. F. Moryson, Itin., III. I. iii. 49. A Traveller to Rome must have the backe of an Asse, the belly of a Hogge, and a conscience as broad as the Kings highway.
1620. Venner, Via Recta, v. 87. Asses milke appertaineth rather vnto physicke then vnto meat.
1739. T. Sheridan, Persius, i. 23. As the World goes, who has not Asses Ears?
1760. Wesley, Wks. (1872), III. 9. Procuring a fresh horse, about the size of a jackass, I rode on.
1782. Cowper, Gilpin, li. While he spoke, a braying ass Did sing most loud and clear.
b. fig. ‘Beast of burden.’
1614. Raleigh, Hist. World, II. V. iii. § 1. 359. He … makes himself … an Asse; and thereby teacheth others, either how to ride, or driue him.
1635. Pagitt, Christianogr., 237. This Kingdome … usually stiled the popes Asse, which hee rode at his pleasure, til she was able to beare him no longer.
c. The ass has, since the time of the Greeks, figured in fables and proverbs as the type of clumsiness, ignorance and stupidity; hence many phrases and proverbial expressions. (Chiefly since 1500; the early references to the animal being mostly Scriptural, with no depreciatory associations.)
c. 1200. Ormin, 3714. Mannkinn … skillæs swa summ asse.
c. 1400. Apol. Loll., 57. Wan an vndiscret is maad bischop in þe kirk, þan is an hornid asse born þer in.
1590. Nashe, Anat. Absurd., E j b. That which thou knowest not peraduenture thy Asse can tell thee.
1599. Thynne, Animadv. (1875), 5. Wrangle for one asses shadow, or to seke a knott in a rushe.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 21. A dull Scholar not apt to learn, is bid to sell an Asse to signifie his blockishness.
1611. Cotgr., s.v. Asne, As angrie as an Asse with a squib in his breech.
1620. Shelton, Quix., III. xxviii. 201. Well, well, the Honey is not for the Ass’s mouth. Ibid., xxxv. 254. An Ass laden with Gold will go lightly up hill.
1622. Middleton & Rowley, Old Laws, III. i. Asses have ears as well as pitchers.
1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, I. xi. He … would act the Asses part to get some bran.
1711. Addison, Spect., No. 13, ¶ 4. The ill-natured world might call him the Ass in the Lion’s Skin.
1868. Freeman, Norm. Conq., II. viii. 277. An unlettered king is a crowned ass.
d. To make an ass of: to treat as an ass, stultify. To make an ass of oneself: to behave absurdly, stultify oneself.
1590. Shaks., Mids. N., III. i. 124. This is to make an asse of me, to fright me, if they could.
1865. Trollope, Belton Est., xx. 241. Don’t make such an ass of yourself as to suppose that [etc.].
1866. Fraser’s Mag., 284/1. They could not be deprived of the common right of Englishmen to make asses of themselves if they liked it.
e. Asses’ Bridge or Pons Asinorum: a humorous name now given to the fifth proposition of the first book of Euclid’s Elements.
c. 1780. Epigram.
| If this be rightly called the bridge of asses, | |
| He’s not the fool that sticks, but he that passes. |
1860. All Y. Round, 560. He never crossed the ass’s bridge.
2. Hence transf. as a term of reproach: An ignorant fellow, a perverse fool, a conceited dolt. Now disused in polite literature and speech.
1578. Lyte, Dodoens, 348. Landleapers, roges, and ignorant asses.
1598. Shaks., Merry W., I. i. 176. I am not altogether an asse.
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., II. iii. II. (1651), 316. A nobleman … a proud fool, an arrant asse.
1717. Pope, Let. Hon. R. Digby, Wks. 1737, VI. 73. They think our Doctors asses to them.
1828. Scott, F. M. Perth, I. 39. I am but an ass in the trick of bringing about such discourse.
1843. Lever, J. Hinton, iv. (1878), 25. Lord Dudley de Vere, the most confounded puppy, and the emptiest ass.
3. Astr. The Two Asses: the stars γ and δ of the constellation Cancer, on either side of the nebula Præsepe (the Crib).
1556. Recorde, Cast. Knowl., 266. Other two starres are called the Asses whiche seeme to stande at the Crybbe.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 17. The two Asses, placed there as some say, by Bacchus.
4. Comb. a. General relations: (a) appositive, as ass beast; (b) possessive genitive, as ass bone, ear, flesh, hoof, stall (where ass’s would now be usual), ass colo(u)r; (c) objective genitive, as ass-driver, -keeper; (d) attrib. as ass argument (i.e., asinine); (e) parasynthetic deriv. as ass-colo(u)red, ass-eared.
c. 1375. Wyclif, Serm., xcviii. Sel. Wks. 1869, I. 345. Þanne mai we telle scorne by sich *asse argumentis.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 14963. Þar sal yee find an *ass beist. Ibid., 7171. Hefand an *assban.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 356. This Beast … is of a Mouse or *Ass colour.
1658. Rowland, trans. Moufet’s Theat. Ins., 1048. A little creature with many feet, *Asse-coloured.
1564. Bauldwin, Mor. Phil. (Palfr.), i. (1595), 19. Till they perceived captaines of armies to be *asse-drivers.
1672. Davenant, Law agst. Lovers (1673), 309. Have her *Ass-ears in publick bor’d, as Love’s Known Slave.
1629. Symmer, Spir. Posie, To Reader A iij b. Some *asse-ear’d Midas will misconstrue these words of the Wise-man.
1831. Carlyle, Misc. (1857), II. 224. Not overloaded with Ass-eared giants.
1822. T. Mitchell, Aristophanes, II. 190. *Ass-flesh, as food, is far preferable to beef and even to veal.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 338. To strew vpon them the ashes of an *asse-hoofe.
1591. Percivall, Sp. Dict., Asnero, an *Asse keeper.
c. 1400. Epiph. (Turnb., 1843), 140. Lyyng in a *nasse stall, Invenerunt puerum.
b. Special combinations: ass-back, like horseback, in later times humorously; ass-colt or -foal, the young of an ass; ass-herd, a keeper of asses; ass-like a., like an ass, asinine; ass-man, a driver or letter out of asses; assmanship, asswomanship, humorously after horsemanship; ass-mare, a she-ass; ass-mill, one driven by an ass; ass-parsley, obs. name of some umbelliferous plant; ass-ship, condition or quality of an ass; humorously after lordship; ass-woman, female of ass-man. Also ASS-HEAD, -HEADED q.v.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. XVIII. 11. Barfote on an *asse bakke.
1766. Smollett, Trav., 42. The way of riding most used in this place is on assback.
1800. Southey, in C. Southey, Life, II. 109. Edith and myself on *ass-back.
1587. Golding, De Mornay, xxx. 481. Tying his *Assecolt [Coverdale, asses colte] to the vyne, and the foale of his sheeasse to the hedge.
a. 1617. Hieron, Wks., II. 166. In his birth he is but like a wild asse-colt.
1595. Hunnis, Life Joseph, 72. He shall bind his *Asse fole fast vnto the pleasant vine.
c. 1450. Gloss., in Wright, Voc., 213. Hic asinarius, a *nashard.
1652. Gaule, Magastrom., 351. Quoth the asse-herd, the lot means another, and not me.
1567. Drant, Horace Epist., I. xiii. E iij. Least thou *asslyke unloden the with greater note of cryme.
1581. Sidney, Def. Poesie (Arb.), 59. They would make an Ass-like braying against Poesie.
1770. G. White, Selborne, xxviii. 79. The head was about twenty inches long, and ass-like.
1718. Ozell, trans. Tournefort’s Voy., I. 121. They burn nothing in this Island but Under-Wood, and for fifteen or twenty Pence, they buy an *Ass-load of it.
1741. A. Hill, Lett. to Mallet, 21 Dec., Wks. 1754, II. 174. One might reduce, I believe, all the ass-loads of paper which have been pompously wasted upon this subject, into a contraction, like the nut-shell of Homer.
a. 1500. MS. Bodl., 565 (Halliw.). And ye most ȝeve yowre *asman curtesy a grot other a grosset of Venyse.
1859. N. & Q., Ser. II. VIII. 17. Of … this assman, as he was called, I have an anciently engraved copper-plate card.
1882. Punch, 24 June. They witch the world with noble *assmanship.
1598. Barckley, Felic. Man, II. (1603), 88. Who rode … uppon a silly *assemare.
1591. Percivall, Sp. Dict., Atahona, an *Asse mill.
1611. Cotgr., Cicutaire, mock Chervill, wild Chervill, great Chervill, *Asse Perseley.
1610. Healey, St. Aug., City of God, 694. Yet had he his humane reason still, as Apuleus had in his *asse-ship.
1729. T. Cooke, Tales, Prop. &c., 87. Ended thus his *Assship’s Reign.
1728. Daily Post, 7 July. The famous Stoke Newington *Ass-woman dares me to fight her for the 10 pounds.
1800. Southey, Lett. (1856), I. 119. Edith has made a great proficiency in *asswomanship.
