Forms: 5 kele, 5–7 keil(l, (6 keile, keyle), 6–7 keele, (8 kiell), 7– keel. [app. a. MDu. kiel (= MLG. kêl, kîl, MHG. kiel), ship, boat, repr. a Com. Teut. word (*keuloz) which appears (chiefly in poetry) as OE. céol, OS. kiol, OHG. chiol, cheol, chiel, ON. kjóll. These forms cannot be connected with ON. kjǫl-r keel (see KEEL sb.1); but under the influence of Scandinavian, English, or French, or of all combined, the Du. and G. kiel has since the 16th c. lost its original sense of ‘ship’ and acquired that of ‘keel’ (KEEL sb.1): see Grimm, Kluge.
OE. céol would have given *cheel in modern Eng.]
1. A flat-bottomed vessel, esp. of the kind used on the Tyne and Wear for the loading of colliers; a lighter.
The name is or has been in local use in the east of England from the Tyne to the Norfolk Broads; it has also been used in U.S. locally both for a river and a coasting vessel. The old keel that brought coal from the upper Tyne to ships in the harbor at Tynemouth was carvel-built and had a square sail, as well as a heavy oar worked by three keel-bullies. The existing keel is clinker-built and used only for riverside traffic. See R. Oliver Heslop in N. & Q., 9th Ser. VII. 65–6.
1322. [implied in KEELER1].
1421. Act 9 Hen. V., c. 10. Certeinz vesselx appellez Keles, par les queux tielx charbons sont caries de la terre jesques a les naefs en le dit port.
1531–2. Act 23 Hen. VIII., c. 18. Many shippes, keiles, cogges, and botes … haue heretofore had their franke passages … vpon the saide riuer.
1546. Langley, Pol. Verg. de Invent., III. xi. 78. Pheniciens [invented] the Keele or demye barke.
1600. Holland, Livy, XXI. lvii. 426. Convoy of victuals … which came by the Po, in Keeles and such like vessels.
1669. Lond. Gaz., No. 342/4. Two Wisbidge Keels were forced upon the shoar in this Bay.
1708. J. C., Compl. Collier (1845), 48. Those Persons who live at the Ports and have Keels (which are much like to Lighters Built) to load the Ships.
1808. Pike, Sources Mississ., III. App. 31. It … is 300 yards wide and navigable for large keels.
1833. Ht. Martineau, Tale of Tyne, ii. 41. A waggon was at the moment being emptied into a keel.
1863. in Tyneside Songs, 16. Weel may the keel row, that my laddie’s in.
1869. Freeman, Norm. Conq., III. xiv. 362. [The Wharfe] still navigable as high as Tadcaster for the small craft of the river, whose local name of keels suggests the memory of the first vessels which landed our fathers in the Isle of Britain.
1876. in Ruskin, Fors Clav., VI. 395. Humber Keels are … house and home to the Keel family.
1883. G. C. Davies, Norfolk Broads, iv. (1884), 32. There was another class of vessels called ‘Keels,’ which were fitted with huge square lug-sails, and were chiefly used for carrying timber. These are now unknown.
b. The quantity of coals carried in a keel, now = 8 Newcastle chaldrons or 21 tons 4 cwt.
The statute of 1421 shows that a keel was then supposed to carry 20 chalders, but the weight of the chalder is not given (cf. quot. 1529 below).
[1421. Act 9 Hen. V., c. 10. Tieles Keles del portage … de xx chaldrez.
1529. W. Frankeleyn, in Fiddes, Wolsey (1726), II. 165. A great substance of colis to the nombre of 25 score kele, every kele contayning 20. chald’.]
1750. Clephone, Jrnl., in C. Innes, Sk. Early Sc. Hist., App. (1861), 550. A kiell is 8 chalder.
1763. Sir S. T. Janssen, Smuggling Laid Open, 112. An ordinary Ship-Load [of coals] is about fifteen Keel, every Keel is about eight Newcastle Chaldron, and each of those Chaldrons are seventy two Bushels.
1815. Chron., in Ann. Reg., 82. Scale for manning the ships … ships of six keels, four men two boys.
1851. Kipping, Sail-making (ed. 2), 92, note. A collier is said to carry so many ‘keels of coals.’
2. Used to render OE. céol in the passage of the O.E. Chron. relating to the first coming of the Angles to Britain. (Cf. CHIULE, CYULE.)
In this use often erroneously identified with KEEL sb.2, on the analogy of L. carīna keel and ship.
[c. 525. Gildas, De Excidio Brit., xxiii. Tribus, ut lingua ejus [gentis] exprimitur, cyulis, nostra lingual ongis navibus.
a. 1000. O. E. Chron., an. 449 (Laud MS.). Hi þa coman on þrim ceolum hider to Brytene.]
1605. Verstegan, Dec. Intell., xv. Hingistus and Horsus … had the conduction of these forces over into Brittains in three great and long shippes, then called keeles.
1685. Stillingfl., Orig. Brit., v. 313. The Angles or Saxons … came hither in three Keels or long Boats at first.
1881. Green, Making Eng., i. 28. In three ‘keels’ … these Jutes landed at Ebbsfleet in the Isle of Thanet.
3. Comb., as keel-holder, -owner; keel-deeter (-dighter), dial. (see quot. 1789 and DIGHT v. 14 f). See also KEEL-BOAT, -BULLY, -MAN1.
1789. Brand, Hist. Newcastle, II. 262, note. The wives and daughters … who sweep the keels, and have the sweepings for their pains, are called Keeldeeters.
1891. Pall Mall Gaz., 14 Feb., 6/2. A small keelholder in Hull. Ibid., 1 June, 1/3. The son of a small keelowner.
