sb. [f. JACK sb.1 37 + ASS.]
1. A male ass, a he-ass.
1727. Arbuthnot, Coins, 128. Pliny relates from Varro that a Jack-ass for a Stallion was bought for 3,229l. 3s. 4d.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), II. 385. I have seen a jack-ass, from that country, above fifteen hands high.
1803. A. Young, in A. Hunter’s Georg. Ess., III. 197. The Earl of Egremont, early in 1800 established a team of six Jack-asses for carting.
1815. Scott, Guy M., viii. She often contrived to … give him a ride upon her jackass.
1899. Morley, in Westm. Gaz., 26 May, 9/1. The old Greeks, when disputing and debating about idle contentions, had an expression that they were contending for the shadow of a jackass.
2. Applied opprobriously to a stupid or foolish person, a dolt, a blockhead: = ASS 2.
1823. Scott, Peveril, vii. I … began … to think I had borne myself something like a jackass in the matter.
1870. Dickens, E. Drood, iv. The purest Jackass in Cloisterham.
3. Laughing Jackass (also in mod. use simply jackass): the Giant Kingfisher of Australia (Dacelo gigas), so called from its loud discordant cry.
The name is also given to a kind of owl (Sceloglaux albifacies) in New Zealand, and Jackass or Derwent Jackass to a shrike (Cracticus cinereus) in Tasmania.
1798. D. Collins, Acc. N. S. Wales, 615 (Morris). Bird named by us the Laughing Jackass.
1833. C. Sturt, S. Australia, II. iv. 100. He returned with … a laughing jackass … a species of king’s-fisher, a singular bird, found in every part of Australia.
1847. Leichhardt, Jrnl., x. 326. The laughing Jackass (Dacelo cervina, Gould) of this part of the country, is of a different species from that of the eastern coast.
1848. H. W. Haygarth, Bush Life Australia, xii. 130. The silence … was broken in a startling manner by the loud note, ha! ha! ha! of the ‘laughing jackass.’
1859. H. Kingsley, G. Hamlyn, xviii. 148. Below us, in the valley, a mob of jackasses were shouting and laughing uproariously.
1880. Mrs. Meredith, Tasman. Friends & Foes, 110 (Morris). We, too, have a ‘jackass,’ a smaller bird, and not in any way remarkable, except for its merry gabbling sort of song.
1882. T. H. Potts, Out in the Open, 122 (ibid.). Athene Albifacies, wekau of the Maoris, is known by some up-country settlers as the big owl or laughing jackass.
4. Naut. a. A kind of heavy rough boat used in Newfoundland. (Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., 1867.) b. = Hawse-bag: see HAWSE sb.1 5 (U.S.)
5. attrib. (in sense 2) as jackass author, etc.; Comb., as jackass-driver, -headed adj.; jackass-brig, ‘a brig with square topsail and topgallant-sail instead of a gaff-topsail’ (Cent. Dict.): jackass copal, the raw copal of Zanzibar: see quots.; jackass-deer, an African antelope, the singsing; jackass-fish, a fish of the Australian seas (Chilodactylus macropterus), highly esteemed as food; jackass frigate (see quot. and cf. donkey-frigate: FRIGATE sb. 2 b, quot. 1867); jackass penguin, a common species of penguin (Spheniscus demersus), so called from its cry; jackass pick (see quot.); jackass rabbit = JACK-RABBIT; jackass-rigged a., ? rigged like a jackass-brig.
1884. J. Fitzpatrick, To an Old Printer. And many a *jackass author has his wit Saved from damnation’s literary pit.
1860. Reade, Cloister & H., lv. (1896), 157. A dog as big as a *jackass colt.
1872. R. F. Burton, Zanzibar, I. 357. These places supply only the raw or unripe Copal, locally called Chakazi, and by us corrupted to *Jackass.
1887. Sci. Amer., 28 May, 340/2. The raw, or true, copal is called chackaze, corrupted by the Zanzibar merchant to jackass copal.
1829. Gen. P. Thompson, Exerc. (1842), I. 143. Your poor industrious *jackass-driver.
1808. Morris, Austral English, Morwong, the New South Wales name for the fish Chilodactylus macropterus; also called the Carp and *Jackass-fish.
1833. Marryat, P. Simple, xiii. ‘What do you mean by a *jackass frigate?’ inquired I. ‘I mean one of your twenty-eight gun ships, so called, because there is as much difference between them and a real frigate, like the one we are sailing in, as there is between a donkey and a racehorse.’
1851. Voy. to Mauritius, i. 10. The skipper looks anxiously toward the man of war, a jackass frigate, lying lower down the harbour.
1883. Black, Shandon Bells, xii. To be jumped upon by a *jackass-headed old idiot like that.
1863. G. Kearney, Links in Chain, ix. 195. The famous *Jackass Penguin.
1865. Reader, 29 April, 486/2. Commonly called the ‘Jackass Penguin,’ from its habit, while on shore, of throwing its head backwards, and making a loud strange noise like the braying of that animal.
1874. J. H. Collins, Metal Mining, 60. When the pick is much used as a lever, the head is frequently formed … with a projecting wing to afford increased support to the helve. This is called a *jackass pick.
1851. Audubon, Vivip. Quadr. N. A., II. 97. All ideas of blue mountains, vast rolling prairies, etc., were cut short by a *jackass-rabbit bounding from under our horses’ feet.
1883. Leisure Hour, 475/2. Jackass rabbits (the Californian hare), and numbers of … grey-land squirrels … scampered … over the flats.
1810. Sporting Mag., XXXVI. 168. To have *jack-ass racing upon particular days.
1883. E. F. Knight, Cruise ‘Falcon’ (1887), 32. October 19th … passed a *jackass-rigged craft.
Hence Jackass v. intr., to ride a jackass; Jackassery, the character of a jackass (see 2), gross folly or stupidity; (with pl.) something characteristic of a jackass, a piece of folly; Jackassification, the action of making a jackass of, stultification; Jackassism, = jackassery; Jackassness, the quality of being a jackass, gross foolishness. (All more or less nonce-wds.)
1893. Leland, Mem., I. 228. Driving in a Russian telega, or *jackassing in Egypt.
1833. Fraser’s Mag., VII. 618. The genius of *jackassery is not always to rule us.
1889. Mrs. Randolph, New Eve, II. xiii. 206. He will clothe his body after the latest jackasseries of the masher.
1822. Blackw. Mag., XII. 57. Acting on the principle of the general *jackassification of mankind,… he abuses them right and left.
1845. Barham, Ingol. Leg., Wedding-Day, 46. Calling names, whether done to attack or to back a schism, Is … a great piece of *jack-ass-ism.
1803. Southey, Lett. (1856), I. 238. The crimes of pedantry, stupidity, *jackassness.
1885. Mrs. C. L. Pirkis, Lady Lovelace, I. v. 74. To convey such news … was the very essence of Jackassness.
