Sunning

vbl. sb. [f. SUN sb. and v. + -ING¹.]

  1.  Exposure to the sun; basking in the sun.

1519.  Horman, Vulg., 169 b. They chaunge the naturall colour of theyr heare with crafty colour and sonnynge [L. insolatione].

1693.  Sir T. P. Blount, Nat. Hist., 42. There are some who affirm, that Cinnamon … acquires its … strength by fifteen Days Sunning.

1828.  P. Cunningham, N. S. Wales (ed. 3), II. 278. Our wo-begone widows are frequently … scarce permitted to give their mourning weeds the benefit of a second day’s sunning before they are entangled in another matrimonial web.

1889.  Anthony’s Photogr. Bull., II. 53. Where it is necessary to degrade the whites of hard prints, that is easily done by sunning.

1894.  Walsh, Coffee (Philad.), 96. Three days’ thorough sunning usually suffices to render the coffee quite dry and brittle.

  attrib.  1847.  Stoddart, Angler’s Comp., 308. Pike … when on the bask, or in sunning humour.

  b.  In phr. a sunning (see A prep.¹ 12, 13), esp. in to set (lay) a sunning, to expose to the sun, to sun; also to sit, hang a sunning.

1510.  Stanbridge, Vocabula (W. de W.), C vj b. Apricor, to syt a sonnynge or to sonne.

c. 1518.  Kalender of Sheph., A v. For & clerkes shewe them bokes of cunnynge, They bydde them lay them vp a sonnynge.

1519.  Horman, Vulg., 40. Sette these waters a sonnynge.

1600.  Nashe, Summer’s Last Will, 198. Old wiues a sunning sit.

1633.  T. James, Voy., 42. They hung a Sunning all day.

1660.  F. Brooke, trans. Le Blanc’s Trav., 67. They gather the cinnamon … then lay it a fortnight a sunning.

1664.  Comenius’ Janua Ling., 500. Linnen … is laid a sunning to whiten.

1680.  Otway, Caius Marius, V. i. When they are set a Sunning upon the Capitol.

1885.  Sarah O. Jewett, Marsh Isl., xi. The pies were baked, and the pots and pans still a-sunning.

  † 2.  Shining like the sun, radiance. Obs. rare.

c. 1586.  C’tess Pembroke, Ps. LXXXIX. vi. On pathes enlighted by thy faces sunning.

  3.  Fishing. A method of catching salmon by spearing them when dazzled or alarmed by the reflection of sunlight from some bright object.

1843.  Scrope, Salmon Fishing, x. 209. Sunning … is a mode of taking salmon with a spear by sun light.

1895.  Pall Mall Gaz., 26 July, 9/2. In Norway we have seen the sunning carried on by means of a painted board illuminated by a large lens.

  So Sunning ppl. a., basking in the sun.

1902.  Bliss Carman, in Academy, 1 March, 225/2.