Obs. Forms: 4–6 tirue, tyrue (= -ve), 4 turue (= -ve), (5 terve), 6 tirve, tyrff. [Not in OE.; known from 1300. Identical in meaning with TIRR v. (which seems to be a reduced form of the same word), and TIRL v.2 App. distinct in sense from next; but, formally, *tyrfan and *tierfan might both be derived from different grades of a verbal ablaut series *terð-, tarð-, turð-.
It has also been suggested to represent an OE. *tyrfan, deriv. of turf, TURF, to have originally meant ‘to strip the turf off the ground,’ and to have been extended to stripping the turf or thatch off roofs, the clothes off persons, and the hides off beasts. This is plausible, but is not favored by the chronology of the senses.]
1. trans. To roll or pull back, or pluck off (the covering, clothes, skin, etc., from a person or animal); to strip off (clothes, armor; the thatch, slates, or roof of a house, stack, etc.).
c. 1300. Havelok (1902), 603. [They] sone … funden, Als he [= they] tirueden of [= off] his serk On his rith shuldre a kyne merk.
13[?]. E. E. Allit. P., B. 630. He [Abraham] cached to his cobhous & a calf bryngez … bed tyrue of þe hyde.
13[?]. Gaw. & Gr. Knt., 1921. Syþen þay tan raynarde & tyruen of his cote.
a. 1400–50. Alexander, 4114. Tuke out þe tuskis & þe tethe & teruen of þe skinnes.
1513. Douglas, Æneis, V. v. 32. A habirgeoun … Quhilk he,… with his strang handis two, Tirvit and rent of bald Demoleo.
b. To strip (a person) of his clothes, etc., (an animal) of its skin, (a house) of its roof; to strip naked or bare; to unroof.
[c. 1300. Havelok, 918. Ful wel kan ich cleuen shides, Eles to-turuen of here hides.]
c. 1386. Chaucer, Can. Yeom. Prol. & T., 721 (Ellesm.). The deuel out of his skyn Hym terve [other MSS. torne, turne] I pray to god.
1500–20. Dunbar, Poems, lxxii. 23. Of his claiihis thai tirvit him bair. Ibid., 33. In tene, thai tirvit him agane, And till ane pillar thai him band.
1533. Bellenden, Livy, V. xi. (S.T.S.), II. 187. He gart tirve [v.r. tyrff] þis maister nakit of al his clothis.
1590–1. Reg. Privy Council Scot., IV. 587. The said Naper … and others … come and tirvit the said complenaris houssis, and tuke of the rigging and thak thairof.
