The name (OE. Súþseaxe ‘South Saxons’) of a maritime county in the southeast of England; used attrib. in designations of things produced in or peculiar to the county, as breeds of cattle, agricultural implements, etc.
1704. Dict. Rust. (1726), s.v. Plough, The Sussex single Wheel-Plough.
1818. Compl. Grazier (ed. 3), Introd. 3. The Sussex and Hereford breeds [of cows].
1834. Youatt, Cattle, 41. The loins of the Sussex ox are wide.
1837. Brit. Husb. (Libr. Usef. Knowl.), II. Index, Sussex waggon [described I. 155].
1846. Youatt, Pig (1847), Index, Sussex pigs.
1855. Poultry Chron., III. 534/2. My declining to adopt the name of Hamburg for the Bolton Greys and Bays, or that of Dorking for the Sussex fowls.
1856. ‘Stonehenge,’ Brit. Rural Sports, 59. A good, useful team of the Sussex spaniels.
1875. Encycl. Brit., I. 392/2. These sheep are now usually classed as Sussex Downs and Hampshire Downs. Ibid. (1885), XIX. 645/2. The Surrey and Sussex fowls are four-toed.
† b. Sussex crest, a name for the cuckold’s ‘horn.’ Obs.
1681. T. Flatman, Heraclitus Ridens, No. 8 (1713), I. 49. A Cuckold is always to be the last Man that knows he has got a Sussex Crest.
c. Sussex marble, a marble occurring in thin beds in the Wealden clay of Sussex and Kent, formerly much used for pillars in churches.
1753. Chambers’ Cycl., Suppl.
1850. Ansted, Elem. Geol., Min., etc., 379. Weald clay, with subordinate limestone (called Sussex marble) and sand.
Hence † Sussexan, † Sussexian adjs. rare, belonging to Sussex.
1622. Drayton, Poly-olb., xvii. 423. Clear Lavant, that doth keep the Southamptonian side (Dividing it well-near from the Sussexian lands).
1614. Disc. Strange & Monstrous Serpent, B 2 b. I will conclude this generall discovrse of Serpents, and come to the particular description of our Sussexan Serpent.
