Forms: 5 spyttle, 6 spyttel, -ell, spitell, 6– spittle. [Modification of SPATTLE sb.1 or SPETTLE, after SPIT v.2]

1

  1.  Saliva, spit.

2

  To lick, to swallow, (one’s) spittle: see LICK v. 1 b, and SWALLOW v.

3

1480.  Caxton, Myrr., II. XV. 100. The spyttle of a man fastyng sleeth comynly the spyncoppe & the tode yf it touche them.

4

1530.  Palsgr., 274. Spyttell that cometh out of the mouthe, crachat, saliue.

5

1594.  T. B., La Primaud. Fr. Acad., II. 97. Although spittle be but an excrement and superfluitie,… yet it is not vnprofitable, because it wetteth and moysteneth the tongue.

6

1650.  Bulwer, Anthropomet., ix. 103. Their gums are seen with their teeth, their spittle slavering forth.

7

1673.  Phil. Trans., VIII. 6152. When he treats of the Tast, he well considers … the nature of the Spittle.

8

1710.  J. Clarke, trans. Rohault’s Nat. Philos. (1729), I. 169. Those [bodies] that are perfectly dry or hard, have no Taste ’till they are mixed with our Spittle.

9

1782.  Priestley, Corrupt. Chr., II. VII. 84. The priest touched his mouth and ears with spittle.

10

1841.  Lane, Arab. Nts., I. 96. He put his finger to his mouth, and moistened it with his spittle.

11

1862.  J. F. Campbell, Tales W. Highl., III. 270. Under cats, and dogs, and men’s spittle.

12

  b.  Sc. A quantity of saliva ejected at one time.

13

1722.  Ramsay, Three Bonnets, III. 20. His floor was a’ tobacco spittles.

14

179[?].  W. Simson, in Poets of Ayr. (1910), 34. Scots rhyme then, though prime then, Will no’ be worth a spittle.

15

1822.  Galt, Sir A. Wylie, I. xxi. 178–9. A gauze gown … spoilt with a spittle, or ony other foul thing out of the mouth of man.

16

  † 2.  a. Spittle of the sun, gossamer. Obs.–1

17

1574.  Hyll, Weather, viii. Many long webbes (which some call the spittle of the Sun) driving in the aire, declare winde, or a tempest to folow.

18

  † b.  Spittle of the stars, honey-dew; nostoc. Obs.

19

1577.  B. Googe, Heresbach’s Husb., IV. (1586), 180 b. Hony dewe,… a certaine spittle of the starres.

20

1656.  T. White, Peripatet. Instit., 148. When any such matter is found in the Fields, the very Countrey-men cry it fell from Heav’n and the Starres, and, as I remember, call it the Spittle of the Starres.

21

1657.  S. Purchas, Pol. Flying-Ins., 133. Pliny affirmed the Hony-dew to bee either the sweat of the heaven, or the slaver or spittle of the stars.

22

  3.  The frothy secretion of an insect. Cf. CUCKOO-SPIT, -SPITTLE.

23

1821.  Clare, Vill. Minstr., I. 135. Insects of mysterious birth … Hid in knots of spittle white.

24

  4.  Special Combs.: spittle-ball, a ball of chewed paper wet with saliva; † spittle-bishop, a Roman Catholic bishop (in allusion to the use of spittle in baptism); spittle-fly, -insect, U.S. an insect forming, or bred in, a frothy secretion; † spittle-wort, pellitory, Anacyclus Pyrethrum.

25

1555.  Philpot, in Strype, Eccl. Mem. (1721), III. App. 159. I have ben six tymes in examination, twice before the spitell bishopes.

26

1580.  Blundevil, Horsemanship, IV. 43 b. Pirethum, otherwise called of some Spittlewort.

27

1885.  C. G. Leland, Brand-New Ballads, 4.

        As in country schools the urchins cast each one a spittle-ball,
Till at last a monstrous paper fungus gathers on the wall.

28