a. Also spick-and-span new. (For other variations see quots.) [Emphatic extension of SPAN-NEW a. The same first element appears in the synonymous Du. and Flem. spikspeldernieuw, -splinternieuw (WFlem. -spankelnieuw).] Absolutely or perfectly new; brand-new; perfectly fresh or unworn.
The β-quots. show the more unusual spellings.
α. 1579–80. North, Plutarch (1895), II. 217. They were all in goodly gilt armours, and brave purple cassocks apon them, spicke, and spanne newe.
c. 1590. Forewords to Stubbes’ Anat. (1877), 38. A spicke and spanne new Geneua Bible.
1614. B. Jonson, Barth. Fair, III. V. (1904), 66. Sir, this is a spell against ’hem, spicke and span new.
1659. Fuller, App. Inj. Innoc., II. 31. The Animadvertor will not wear words at the second hand of my using, but will have them spick and span new of his own making.
a. 1668. Davenant, Jeffereidos, I. Wks. (1673), 225.
| At last, they found him close, beneath a spick |
1742. Lond. Mag., 611. A spick and span new French or Dutch Habit.
1771. Wesley, Wks. (1872), IX. 181. This discovery is spick and span new. I never heard of it before.
1818. Lady Morgan, Autobiog. (1859), 165. These façades … with spick-and-span-new plaster of Paris and patent cement.
1879. Sala, Paris Herself Again (1880), II. xvii. 270. Its gilt railings … looked spick-and-span new.
1893. H. Vizetelly, Glances Back, I. i. 22. The handsome horses in spick-and-span new harness.
Comb. 1607. Middleton, Fam. Love, IV. iii. I am … of the spick and span new-set-up company of porters.
β. 1583. Golding, Calvin on Deut. clxxxii. 1130/1. They [Papists] make men beleeue that the breade is no more a materiall thing…. And that is spycke and spawne newe.
1598. Florio, s.v. Trinca, Nuoua di trinca, as we vse to say spike and span new.
1653. Gataker, Vind. Annot. Jer., 73. In his Preface to his spik and span New Ephemeris.
1663. Killigrew, Parson’s Wedding, II. vii. Spik and span new arguments.
c. 1789. Mrs. Unwin, Lett., in Burgon, Twelve Good Men (1888), II. 351. Two spic and span new pieces.
1855. Whitby Gloss., s.v., Spic-and-span New. See Brandnew.
Hence Spick-and-span newness. rare.
1640. Bp. Hall, Episc., III. vii. 36. The most manifestly spick-and-span-newnesse of this devised Discipline.
