dial. [repr. OE. hlinc: see LINK sb.1] A rising ground; a ridge; a ledge, esp. one on the side of a chalk down; an unplowed strip serving as a boundary between fields.
1591. in Wiltsh. Archæol., etc., Mag., VI. (1860), 195. There leadinge westwarde … to a linche; there contynuinge the same linch to Maddington Waie.
1670. Blount, Glossogr. (ed. 3), Linch (Sax.), a Bank, Wall, or Causey between land and land, or Parish, and Parish, to distinguish the bounds.
1787. Survey, in N. W. Linc. Gloss., s.v., The lands in the fields are called dales and the linches or green strips on each side are called marfurs or meerfurrows.
1797. Maton, West. Counties, II. 186. The declivities were now again distinguished by those singular natural terraces…. I allude to the linches, or linchets, as they are called.
1895. Edin. Rev., April, 350. ‘Linches’ naturally formed by the action of the plough on a hillside.
