a. [f. prec. + -ED.]
1. Having the ears cropped; esp. in dogs, horses, etc., as a means of identification, and in persons as a punishment.
1530. Wells Wills (1890), 194. ij cropyired heyfers.
1626. B. Jonson, Masque of Owls, Wks, 1692, 646. A Crop-ear’d Scrivener, this,… He had his Ears in his Purse.
1629. Davenant, Albovine, Wks. (1673), 430/2. Crop-ear’d too, like Irish Nags.
1706. Lond. Gaz., No. 4234/4. A Black Dutch Dog, crop Ear’d.
1841. Lytton, Nt. & Morn., I. i. He purchased a crop-eared Welsh cob.
2. Having the hair cut short, so that the ears are conspicuous.
This and related terms (cf. quot. 1641–2 in CROPPED 4), applied to the Puritans or ‘Round-heads,’ were probably intended by their opponents to associate them with those whose ears had been cut off as a punishment.
1680. Wood, Life (Oxf. Hist. Soc.), II. 477. Others say he was a crop-ear’d rogue.
a. 1700. B. E., Dict. Cant. Crew, Crop-ear’d-Fellow, whose Hair is so short it won’t hide his Ears.
1760. Foote, Minor, I. The sleek, crop-eared prentice.
1816. Scott, Old Mort., viii. If I were to give the law, never a crop-ear’d cur of the whole pack should bark in a Scotch pulpit.
a. 1839. Praed, Poems (1864), I. 354. Out on the crop-eared boor, That sent me with my standard on foot from Marston Moor.
