a. (sb.) Forms: 1 Brettisc, Bryttisc, Brittisc (Brytisc), 4 Bruttische, 5 Brytysshe, 6 Brutish, 7 Brittish, Britysh, 6– British. [OE. Brettisc, etc., f. Bret, pl. Brett-as, Bryttas, Brittas, the natives of ancient Britain, the Britons: see BRIT and -ISH. The modern spelling is influenced by Latin.]
1. Of or pertaining to the ancient Britons. Now chiefly in ethnological and archæological use.
a. 855. O. E. Chron., an. 508. Her Cerdic and Cynric ofsloʓon ænne Brettisc [Laud MS. Bryttiscne] cyning. Ibid. (a. 1000) (Laud), Introd. Her sind on þis iʓlande fif ʓeþeode · Englisc and Brittisc and Wilsc, and Scyttisc and Pyhtisc and Boc Leden. Ibid. (a. 1100), an. 1075. Se ylca Raulf wæs Bryttisc on his moder healfe, and his fæder wæs Englisc.
1605. Shaks., Lear, III. iv. 189. Fie, foh, and fumme, I smell the blood of a Brittish man.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett. (1650), I. 377. He calls … Helen an English woman; whereas, she was purely British, and that there was no such nation upon earth called English at that time.
1780. Cowper, Boadicea, i. The British warrior queen, Bleeding from the Roman rods.
1870. Knight, Hist. Eng., i. 3. A road, acknowledged to be British, still crosses Salisbury Plain.
† b. = Welsh.
1662. Act of Uniformity 13–14 Chas. II., iv. § 27. That the Book [of Common Prayer] hereunto annexed be truly and exactly translated into the British or Welsh Tongue.
2. Of or belonging to Great Britain, or its inhabitants. In the earlier instances only a geographical term adopted from Latin; from the time of Henry VIII. frequently used to include English and Scotch; in general use in this sense from the accession of James I., and in 17th c., often opposed to Irish; legally adopted at the Union in 1707. Now chiefly used in political or imperial connection, as the British army, British colonies, British India, etc., British ambassador, consul, residents, etc.; also in scientific and commercial use, as British plants, British butterflies, British spirits.
1387. Trevisa, Higden (1865), I. 271. Gallia … is i-closed aboute … wiþ þe Bruttische occean in þe west side. Ibid. (1398), Barth. De P. R., XV. lxvi. (1495), 512. Fraunce … endyth in the north at Brytysshe Occean.
1570–87. Holinshed, Scot. Chron. (1806), I. 43. Amongst the Irish Scotishmen … the petition of the British Scots.
1604. J. Dee, in Hearne, Coll. (1885), I. 64. This Britysh Empire.
1643. Script. Reas. for Defens. Armes, 76. The extirpation of the Brittish Nation, and Protestant Religion in that kingdome [Ireland].
1699. Garth, Dispens., I. 7. How have I kept the Brittish Fleet at ease?
1706–7. Act of Union 6 Anne, xi. § 1 art. 8. Without any mixture of British or Irish salt.
1769. Burke, Pres. St. Nat., Wks. II. 187. Every British merchant in Petersburgh.
1841. W. Spalding, Italy & It. Isl., II. 393. His strange discussions on the British constitution.
1855. Tennyson, Maud, I. xiii. ii. A stony British stare.
1882. Garden, 18 Feb., 112/1. Our common British Ivy.
† 3. Of or belonging to Brittany, Breton. Obs.
1602. Carew, Cornwall, 131 b. One of their auncestours … entertained a British Miller, as that people, for such idle occupations, proue more hardie then our owne.
4. ellipt. as sb. pl. British people, soldiers, etc.
1641. in Mary Hickson, Irel. in 17th C. (1884), II. App. U. 363. [In county Monaghan] there being a little plantation of British, the rebels plundered the town. Ibid. (1652) (1884), I. xxxix. 245. As the Irish rebels marched through the said parish they murdered all the British they could lay their hands on.
1708. Lond. Gaz., No. 4459/3. The British had not a Man kill’d or wounded.
1844. H. H. Wilson, Brit. India, II. vii. II. 269. Appearances began to assume an aspect most unfavourable to the British.
5. Comb., as British-born, -built, -owned adjs., British-man; British crown, a gold coin current in the reign of Charles I.; British gum, a commercial name of dextrin; British school, a public elementary school, on the non-denominational or unsectarian basis of the ‘British and Foreign School Society.’
1711. Shaftesb., Charac. (1737), III. 144. Had it happen’d to one of us British-men to have been born at sea, cou’d we not therefore properly be call’d British-men?
1756. Act 29 Geo. II., xxxiv. § 18. British built Ships or Vessels.
1796. Morse, Amer. Geog., II. 108. Numbers of British-born subjects.
1858. Merc. Mar. Mag., V. 308. British-owned … vessels.
1860. Mayne, Exp. Lex., British Gum (Chem.), term for a species of gum into which starch is converted when exposed to a temperature between 600° and 700° … used as a substitute for gum Arabic in calico printing and other processes.
1866. Crump, Banking, x. 224. Charles I. … Gold [coins] Three-pound piece, angel, unite, double-crown, British-crown.
Hence British-hood, Britishness.
1883. A. Forbes, in 19th Cent., Oct., 722. Their British-hood manifests itself in things big and in things little.
1872. S. Mostyn, Perplexity, III. iii. 46. His thorough Britishness.
