Forms: 4– bark; also 4 barc, 4–7 barke, 6 barcke, 7 barque. [a. Scand. bark- (ON. börkr, Sw., Da. bark):—OTeut. *barku-z.]
1. The rind or outer sheath of the trunk and branches of trees, formed of tissue parallel with the wood. See quot. 1866.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 1321. Braunches … o bark al bare.
c. 1400. Maundev., xvii. 189. Men hewen the Trees … tille that the Bark be parted.
1535. Coverdale, Joel i. 7. They shal pyll of the barckes of my fygetrees.
1642. Fuller, Holy & Prof. St., IV. xiii. 304. He is no friend to the tree, that strips it of the bark.
1675. Grew, Anat. Trunks, I. ii. § 1. The Trunk … hath Three general Parts … the Barque, the Wood, and the Pith.
1866. Treas. Bot., 123. The only true bark is that of Exogens. In Endogens, False Bark, also called Cortical Integument, stands in place of bark.
b. That used as a material in dyeing, tanning, etc., or its bruised residue, ‘spent bark,’ ‘tan.’
1565. Act 8 Eliz., xi. § 3. No Person … shall dye … black, any Cap, with Bark or Swarf.
1594. Plat, Jewell-ho., I. 12. Men which tan the hides of beasts … take ye barkes of Oake.
1716. Lond. Gaz., No. 5393/4. Bark is worth 2s. a Cart-Load.
Mod. The street opposite the sick man’s house was laid with bark.
c. A sort or piece of bark.
1647. W. Browne, Polex., II. 116. Two great chaines of rootes and black barks he had about his neck.
† 2. The rind, husk, or shell of fruit and grains.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. XI. 251. On a walnot with-oute is a bitter barke.
c. 1440. Gesta Rom., lvi. 419. The ape wil gladly ete the kyrnelle of the note … but when he sauours the soure barke [etc.].
1586. Cogan, Haven Health (1636), 34. A good handfull of Oaten barke.
1661. Lovell, Hist. Anim. & Min., 22. Wine in which the barks of a sweet pomegranat are.
† 3. gen. An outer covering or husk; esp. a superficial crust or incrustation. Obs. exc. dial.
1601. Holland, Pliny, I. 45. In the lake Velinus … if wood be thrown in, it is couered ouer with a stony barke.
1725. Pope, Odyss., XIII. 457. O’er thy smooth skin a bark of wrinkles spread.
1878. Halliwell, Dict., Bark, the tartar deposited by bottled wine or other liquor encrusting the bottle.
4. dial. and slang. The (human) skin.
a. 1758. A. Ramsay, Poems (1844), 88. And dang the bark Aff’s shin.
1876. Fam. Herald, 2 Dec., 80/1. With the ‘bark’ all off his shins from a blow with a hockey stick.
5. fig. Envelopment; outer covering; outside, external part. arch.
c. 1374. Chaucer, Troylus, IV. 201. Yboundyn in the blakke barke of care.
c. 1400. Rom. Rose, 7173. The bark and rynde, That makith the entenciouns blynde.
1587. Golding, De Mornay, xxv. 379. Such a Lawgiuer, as not onely had power ouer the barke of man.
1641. J. Jackson, True Evang. T., I. 68. The Jews … stick in the barke, and expound the text to be fulfilled to the very letter of it.
6. phr. To go (etc.) between the bark and the tree.
1562. J. Heywood, Prov. & Epigr. (1867), 47. It were a foly for mee, To put my hande betweene the barke and the tree … Betweene you.
1600. Holland, Livy, XXXVI. v. 921. To deale roundly and simply with no side, but to go between the bark and the tree.
1642. Rogers, Naaman, 303. So audacious as to go betweene barke and tree, breeding suspitions … betweene man and wife.
1804. Mar. Edgeworth, Mod. Griselda, Wks. 1832, V. 299. An instigator of quarrels between man and wife, or, according to the plebeian but expressive apophthegm, one who would come between the bark and the tree. [Cf. Halliwell, Dict., s.v., ‘Between the bark and the wood,’ a well-adjusted bargain, where neither party has the advantage.]
7. specifically in Med. (also Jesuits’ or Peruvian Bark): The bark of various species of the Cinchona tree, from which quinine is procured, formerly ground into powder and taken as a febrifuge.
1704. Watts, Life of Souls. When bark and steel play well their game To save our sinking breath.
1719. D’Urfey, Pills (1872), II. 344. Your Jesuits’ Bark had proved a golden Bough.
1790. Cook’s Voy., VI. 2241. That excellent medicine, Peruvian bark.
1852. Thackeray, Esmond, III. viii. (1876), 393. I have known a woman preach Jesuit’s bark.
fig. 1790. Boswell, Johnson (1811), I. 195. In no writings whatever can be found more bark and steel for the mind.
8. north. dial. A candle-box. (See quot.)
1878. Halliwell, Dict., Bark, a cylindrical receptacle for candles; a candle-box. North. At first it was only a piece of bark nailed up against the wall.
9. Comb. General relations: a. attrib. or objective, as in bark-cloth, -dust, -mill, -puller, -string, -vat, -water, -wose. b. instrumental or limitative, as in bark-bared, -feeder, -formed, -tanned, -tanning.
a. c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 24. Barkarys barkewatyr, naucea.
1483. Cath. Angl., 22/1. Barke duste or wose, frunium, ptipsana.
1569. Wills & Inv. N. C. (1835), 307. Xl barke fatts xiijl. vjs. viijd.
1773. Barnard, in Phil. Trans., LXIII. 218. The bark-pullers … were … alarmed by the shaking.
1854. J. Stephens, Centr. Amer., 13. Tied together with bark-strings.
1880. Miss Bird, Japan, II. 82. A skin or bark-cloth vest.
1885. H. M. Newhall in Harper’s Mag., Jan., 276/1. Most tanners buy bark, which is now sold compressed like hay, and grind it in a bark mill.
b. 1707. Mortimer, Husb., 391. Excorticated and Bark-bared Trees may be preserved by nourishing up a Shoot [etc.].
1818. Art Preserv. Feet, 112. The ancient system of bark tanning.
1858. W. Ellis, Vis. Madagascar, ii. 25. These bark-formed boards were laid side by side.
1859. Darwin, Orig. Spec., iv. (1878), 66. We see leaf-eating insects green, and bark-feeders mottled grey.
1883. Pall Mall Gaz., 5 July, 5/2. Chemicals can produce a good imitation of bark-tanned goods more cheaply and far more quickly.
10. Special combinations: bark-bed, a hot-bed made of spent bark from a tannery; bark-bound a., hindered in growth by excessive tightness of the bark; † bark-cobill (Ger. kubel), a bark-vat; bark-galling (see quot.); bark-heat, that of a bark-bed; bark-house, one in which bark is stored, a tan-house; bark-louse, a kind of aphis infesting the trunks of trees; bark-pit, a pit filled with bark and water in which hides are steeped in tanning; bark-stove, a glazed structure placed over a bark-bed; bark-tree, English name of the Cinchonas; bark-worm (= bark-louse).
1732. Miller, Gard. Kal. (1775), 70. The Coffee-trees … are placed in the *bark-bed.
1615. W. Lawson, Orch. & Gard., III. xiii. (1668), 42. *Bark-bound, a disease in trees.
1673. Grew, Anat. Roots, ii. § 2. Therefore are the Roots of many Herbs, *Barque-bound, as well as the Trunks of Trees.
c. 1550. Sir J. Balfour, Practicks, 588. The sype of thair *bark cobill.
1742. Bailey, *Bark-galling is when trees are galled by being bound to stakes.
1781. Cowper, To Mrs. Hill, 19 Feb. I shall … keep them [seeds] … in a *bark heat.
1483. Cath. Angl., 22/1. *Barkhowse, frunitorium.
1541. Lanc. Wills, I. 81. In ye *barkhouse fyve dikar … tanned.
1732. Miller, Gard. Kal. (1775), 159. Exotic plants … especially those in the *bark-stove.
1783. Davidson, in Phil. Trans., LXXIV. 455 (article), *Bark-Tree.
1852. Th. Ross, Humboldt’s Trav., I. ii. 59, note. The orange *bark-tree (Cinchona lancifolia) … the red *bark-tree (C. oblongifolia).
1655. Moufet & Bennet, Health’s Improv. (1746), 188. Titmice feed … upon Caterpillars, *Bark-Worms and Flies.
1787. Best, Angling, 19. *Bark-worm or Ashgrub, found under the bark of an oak, ash, or beech.
