a. and sb. Chiefly dial. Also 7 -cliff, 9 -clift. [See CLEFT sb. and ppl. a.]
A. adj. (See quots.) rare–0.
1850. Ogilvie, Quarter-cleft Rod, a rod cleft at one end, the cleft extending to one-fourth of its length. Ibid. (1882), Quarter-cleft, said of timber cut from the centre to the circumference.
B. sb. 1. Wood cleft in four; quartered wood; also, one of the pieces produced by cleaving in four.
1641. Best, Farm. Bks. (Surtees), 15. Wee gette the biggest of [the willows] riven with iron wedges into quarter-cliffe. Ibid. Shorte forke-shaftes, made of seasoned ashe, and quarter cliffe.
1887. Scott. Leader, 21 Sept., 6. A large stick known in Tipperary as a ‘quarter-clift.’
2. A slightly crazed or ‘half-cracked’ person.
1831. Fraser’s Mag., IV. 327/1. A mere nincompoop, or quartercliff, or what else you will, that implies feebleness of intellect and deficiency of talents.
1856. Chambers’ Jrnl., V. 139. (Ulster Proverbs, etc.) An eccentric person … is said … to ‘want a square of being round.’ The next degree of aberration constitutes a ‘quarter clift.’
1880. Antrim & Down Gloss., Quarter cleft, a crazy person.
