Sc. & Ir. Also 3–4 can, 3– cane, 6– kane, 8– kain. [a. Celtic cáin, in OIr. ‘statute law,’ mod.Ir. ‘rent, tribute, fine’ (O’Reilly), Gaelic ‘fine, tribute, payment in kind.’ According to Skene (Celtic Scotl., III. 231) the primary meaning was ‘law,’ whence it was applied to ‘any fixed payment exigible by law.’]
1. A portion of the produce of the soil payable to the landlord as rent; a rent paid in kind. In later times used only of the smaller articles, as poultry.
c. 1190. Chartulary of St. Andrews, 45 (Skene). Ab can et cuneveth et exercitu et auxilio.
1251. [Skene cites] Cain, Coneveth, Feacht, Sluaged, & Ich.
a. 1758. Ramsay, Poems (1800), II. 525 (Jam.). The laird got a’ to pay his kain.
1786. Burns, Twa Dogs. Our Laird gets in his racked rents, His coals, his kain, and a’ his stents.
1818. Scott, Hrt. Midl., viii. [He] contrived to maintain his ground upon the estate by regular payment of mail duties, kain, [etc.].
1854. H. Miller, Sch. & Schm. (1858), 259. Under a tree on that inner island … the queen sits and gathers kain for the Evil One.
1876. Grant, Burgh Sch. Scotl., I. i. 7–8. The cane of the lands … amounting to forty stones of cheese, seventy measures of barley and a sheep.
b. attrib.
1597. Skene, Exp. Terms, s.v. Canum, This word, cane, signifies … tribute or dewtie, as cane fowles, cane cheis, cane aites, quhilk is paid be the tennent … as ane duty of the land.
1810. Cromek, Nithsdale Song, 280 (Jam.). It is hinted … that Kain Bairns were paid to Satan, and fealty done for reigning through his division of Nithsdale and Galloway.
1828. Scott, F. M. Perth, III. ii. 45. Cooped up in a convent, like a kain-hen in a cavey.
1872. Cosmo Innes, Sc. Legal Antiq. The cain fowls of a barony are quite well understood. Cain fowls are sometimes called reek hens—one payable from every house that reeked—every fire house.
c. To pay the cain: (fig.) to ‘pay’ the penalty.
a. 1774. Fergusson, Leith Races. Though they should dearly pay the kain, And get their tails weel sautit.
1787. Burns, Tam Samson’s El., ii. To Death she’s dearly paid the kane, Tam Samson’s dead!
1794. in Ritson, Sc. Songs, II. 78 (Jam.). For Campbell rade, but Myrie staid, And sair he paid the kain, man.
2. (Ireland) A fine or penalty for an offence.
1518. Rental Bk. Earl Kildare, in Trans. Kilkenny Archæol. Soc., Ser. II. IV. 123. Item half kanys & penalties wtin the said Gleancappel.
