[f. KERN v.1]
a. Of cereal grains or fruit: (Ill or well) formed, set or hardened. Said also of a crop. † b. Of salt: (Small, large, hard, etc.) -grained. Obs. c. dial. = CORNED a.1 2. d. Of ore: see quot. 1850.
1602. Carew, Cornwall, 20 b. An ill kerned, or saued Harvest, soone emptieth their old store.
c. 1682. J. Collins, Salt & Fishery, 53. It is a pure hard kerned Salt.
1847–78. Halliwell, Kerned beef, salted beef. Hants.
1850. Weale, Dict. Terms, Kerned, a term applied to a heap of mundic or copper ore hardened by lying exposed to the sun.
1865. Pall Mall Gaz., 11 July, 5/1. The straw was about six feet long, and the grain exceedingly well kerned.
