Obs. Forms: 1 lárspell, 2–3 larspel, 3 larspell, (3 lorspel(l, lærspel, larspæl), 4 lorespelle. [f. LORE sb.1 + SPELL sb.] A sermon, instructive discourse.
c. 1000. Ælfric, Saints’ Lives (1881), I. 58. Se bisceop … þam folce sæde … lar-spell.
c. 1175. Lamb. Hom., 63. Bred on grikisce is Larspel to us fuliwis.
c. 1200. Trin. Coll. Hom., 143. Þa iherde hie seggen þat ure drihte on his larspelle sede þat alle men sholden deað þolien.
c. 1205. Lay., 12654. Þa bi-gon he lar-spæl & of gode spæc swiðe wel.
13[?]. Minor Poems fr. Vernon MS., xxxvii. 124. Þreo þinges þer beþ … Seide me þe prest in his lore-spelle For whom I ouȝte loue Ihesu.
