[f. SURVEY v. + -ING1.] The action of the verb SURVEY.
1. The action of viewing or examining in detail (esp. officially); † the exploration (of a country).
1467–8. Rolls of Parlt., V. 598/2. The surveying aswell of the Veerte as of the Venyson of oure Forest.
1577. V. Leigh (title), The … science of Surueying of Landes, Tenementes, and Hereditamentes.
1596. Bacon, Max. & Use Com. Law, II. (1630), 10. Besides surueying of the Pledges of Freemen, and giuing the oath of Allegeance, and making Constables.
1607. in Hist. Wakefield Gram. Sch. (1892), 74. If great occasion shall be for the surveyinge of the whole … of the howses or landes to the schole belonginge.
1622. Callis, Stat. Sewers (1647), 5. Commissions for the surveying and repairing of Walls, Banks and Rivers.
1632. Lithgow (title), The Totall Discourse, Of the Rare Aduentures … of long nineteene Yeares Trauayles … in Surueighing of Forty eight Kingdomes.
2. The process or art of making surveys of land: see SURVEY sb. 5, v. 2, and LAND-SURVEYING.
1551. Recorde, Pathw. Knowl., Ep. King. In suruaiyng & measuring of landes.
1639. Boston Rec. (1877), II. 41. A great lott … twelve acrs, paying for the same … three shillings an acr upon the entrance of the platform or bounders thereof, after the Surveying of it.
1682. Wheler, Journ. Greece, Pref. a ij. I … reduced their Positions into Triangles;… an ordinary rule in surveighing.
a. 1727. Newton, Chronol. Amended, ii. (1728), 248. This King wrote a book of surveying, which gave a beginning to Geometry.
1867. Brande & Cox, Dict. Sci., etc. s.v., Naval Surveying, the science of determining the lines on which seas may be safely navigated.
† 3. Oversight, superintendence. Obs.
1538. Elyot, Libitinarius, he that hath the suruayeng and charge aboute burienges.
4. attrib.: † a. surveying-board, -place, a sideboard or hatch on which the dishes were placed ready for serving at a meal under the direction of the ‘surveyor’ (SURVEYOR 1 d). Obs.
a. 1483. Liber Niger, in Househ. Ord. (1790), 45. xx squires attendaunt uppon the King’s person … to help serve his table from the surveying bourde, and from other places, as the assewer woll assigne.
c. 1543. in Parker, Dom. Archit., III. 78. A new halle, with a squillery, saucery, & surveyng place.
c. 1600. in Archaeologia, LXIV. 392. The surveying place by the kitchin dore.
1608. in Willis & Clark, Cambridge (1886), II. 494. Ye kitchen, butry, surveying place.
b. Applied to instruments or appliances used for, and to ships employed in, surveying.
1641. Milton, Ch. Govt., I. i. Wks. 1851, III. 98. Discipline, whose golden survaying reed … measures every quarter and circuit of new Jerusalem.
1669. Sturmy, Mariner’s Mag., V. i. 2. In that socket you put the head of your three legged Surveying-Staff.
a. 1691. Boyle, Hist. Air (1692), 134. Having gotten together all the surveighing chains the city afforded … we went into the Church.
1701. Moxon, Math. Instr., 17. Reducing scale,… Sometimes ’tis called a Surveying Scale.
1728. Chambers, Cycl., s.v., [The] Surveying Cross … in France … serves in lieu of a Theodolite. Ibid., s.v. Quadrant, The Common, or Surveying Quadrant. Ibid., Perambulator,… an Instrument for the measuring of Distances, call’d also Pedometer, Way-wiser, and Surveying Wheel.
1840. Civil Eng. & Arch. Jrnl., III. 108/2. A very useful … addition to the ordinary Surveying Poles.
1846. Huxley, in L. Huxley, Life & Lett. (1900), I. ii. 26. Surveying ships are totally different from the ordinary run of men-of-war.
1883. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Suppl., Surveying Chain, a measuring chain 66 feet long, with iron rings and links.
1905. A. R. Wallace, Life, I. vi. 86. My strong surveying boots cost 14s. a pair.
