Barred

ppl. a.; also 5 barrid, 6–7 berd(e. [f. BAR v. and sb.¹ + -ED.]

  I.  1. Secured, enclosed, or shut with bars.

1593.  Shaks., Rich. II., I. i. 180. A ten times barr’d vp chest.

1611.  Bible, Song. Sol. iv. 12. A garden inclosed [marg. barred] is my sister.

1820.  Scott, Abbot, xix. The close-barred portal.

1862.  Thornbury, Turner, II. 228. Turner was notoriously a barred-up man, a man who would come to the threshold of his mind … but would by no means open the door.

  II.  Having, or furnished with, a bar or bars.

  2.  generally.

a. 1571.  Jewel, Serm. bef. Queen (1583), The Ægyptians had mighty chariots, straked and barred with yron.

1712.  Steele, Spect., No. 474, ¶ 2. Five-barred gates.

1825.  Scott, Talism., i. His barred helmet of steel.

  3.  Omamented with bars (see BAR sb.¹ 4); striped, streaked.

c. 1340.  Gaw. & Gr. Knt., 159. Silk bordes, barred ful ryche.

c. 1386.  Chaucer, Miller T., 49. A seint she wered barred all of silk.

1387.  Trevisa, Higden, Rolls Ser. VI. 297. Clerks dede awey barred gurdelles.

1459.  Test. Ebor. (1855), II. 235. Meam … Cristenynge-gyrdill barred throgh-oute.

1552.  Eng. Ch. Furniture (1866), 221. One of black velvet and an other of barde silke.

1572.  Bossewell, Armorie, II. 31 b. Armes may in diuerse wise be Barred, and the firste maner is playne and streyghte.

1797.  Bewick, Birds, I. 9. The feathers on the thighs are … pure white; those of the tail are barred.

  4.  Of harbors: Obstructed by a BAR sb.¹ 15.

1552.  T. Barnabe, in Ellis, Orig. Lett., II. II. 198. In all France be barde havens.

1647.  Fuller, Good Th. in Worse T. (1841), 132. Barred havens, choked up with the envious sands.

1796.  Morse, Amer. Geog., I. 427. Its decline is attributed to a barred harbour and shoal rivers.

1858.  Merc. Mar. Mag., V. 48. The river forms a barred harbour.

  † 5.  Barred dice (cf. BAR sb.¹ 21): see quot. Obs.

1532.  Dice Play (1850), 24. Lo, here … a well-favoured die, that seemeth good and square, yet is the forehead longer on the cater & tray than any other way … Such be also called bard cater tres, because, commonly, the longer end will, of his own sway, draw downwards, and turn up to the eye sice, sinke, deuis or ace.

1604.  Dekker, Honest Wh., Wks. 1873, II. 145. She suffred your tongue, like a bard Cater tra, to runne all this while.

  6.  Mus. Marked off by bars: see BAR sb.¹ 16.

1883.  Sir H. Oakeley, Bible Psalter, Pref. 6. To hesitate just before the barred or strict time commences.

  ¶ For BARD ppl. a. = BARDED.

1612.  Drayton, Poly-olb., xii. 206. Armed cap-à-pie upon their barred horse.