Now chiefly U.S. or dial. Also 6–7 croche. [Etymological history obscure. In form it appears to agree with ME. croche shepherd’s crook, crosier, ONF. croche; but in sense it comes nearer to CRUTCH, of which also, in certain applications, crotch appears as a variant. But crutch and crotch are in current use different words.]
† 1. A fork: app. the agricultural implement.
1539. Taverner, Erasm. Prov. (1545), 44. Thrust out nature wyth a croche [Naturam expellas furca] yet woll she styll runne backe agayne.
† 2. A fork formerly used for holding a weed down on the ground, while it was cut off or dragged up with the weed-hook. Obs.
1573. Tusser, Husb. (1878), 112. In Maie get a weede hooke, a crotch and a gloue, and weed out such weedes as the corne doth not loue.
[1873. J. Fowler, in Archæol., XLIV. 179. (Plate), A man, in a garden, cutting up thistles from the plants they grow amongst with a weed-hook and crotch. Ibid., 207, 220.].
3. A stake or pole having a forked top, used as a support or prop.
1573. Tusser, Husb. (1878), 64. The strawberies looke to be couered with strawe, Laid ouerly trim vpon crotchis and bows. Ibid., 79. For hoppoles and crotches in lopping go saue.
1681. Hickeringill, Vind. Naked Truth, II. 1. A Crazy … Fabrick that only stands upon Crotches, and Crotchets.
1700. Dryden, Fables, Baucis and Phil., 160. The crotches of their cot in columes rise [furcas subiere columnæ].
1841. Catlin, N. Amer. Ind. (1844), I. xxii. 162. Four posts or crotches … supporting four equally delicate rods, resting in the crotches.
† b. A forked peg or crook for hanging things on. Obs.
1573. Tusser, Husb. (1878), 36. With crotchis and pinnes, to hang trinkets theron.
c. Naut. A forked support for various purposes: see CRUTCH 3.
4. The fork of a tree or bough, where it divides into two limbs or branches.
1573. Tusser, Husb. (1878), 105. The crotch of the bough.
1641. Best, Farm. Bks. (Surtees), 120. Some [branches] … that have croches [printed creches] will bee for rake-shaftes.
1669. Worlidge, Syst. Agric. (1681), 323. Crotch, the forked part of a Tree useful in many cases of Husbandry.
1758. Acct. Micmakis, etc. 83. Branches of trees … stuck in the ground with the crotch uppermost.
1843–4. T. N. Savage, in Boston Jrnl. Nat. Hist., IV. 383. They [chimpanzees] … build their habitations in trees…. The whole supported by the body of a limb, or a crotch.
1851. J. L. Stephens, Centr. Amer. (1854), 374. A platform in the crotch of the tree.
1889. S. Weir Mitchell, in Century Mag., Aug., 503/1, note. A mass of leaves left by a freshet in the crotch of the divergent branches of a bush.
5. The ‘fork’ or bifurcation of the human body where the legs join the trunk.
a. 1592. Green, Mamillia, ii. Poems (Rtldg.), 316. Some close-breech’d to the crotch for cold.
1615. Crooke, Body of Man, 214. The middle bifurcation at the Crotch.
1817–8. Cobbett, Resid. U.S. (1822), 156. To be split down the middle, from crown to crotch.
1884. Child, Ballads, II. xxix. 259/1. Three hundred years old, with a beard to the crotch.
6. A bifurcation of road or river.
1767. T. Hutchinson, Hist. Mass. Bay, II. 383. The river to be called by the same name, from the crotch to the mouth.
1857. J. G. Holland, Bay Path, xxii. Standing right in the crotch of the roads.
† 7. fig. A dilemma. Obs.
1622. Bacon, Hen. VII., 101. There is a Tradition of a Dilemma that Bishop Morton … vsed, to raise vp the Beneuolence to higher Rates; and some called it his Forke, and some his Crotch [Ellis & Spedding’s ed. crutch].
8. Comb. Crotch-deep a., up to the ‘crotch’ or loins; crotch-stick (dial.), a forked stick; † crotch-tail, old name of the Kite.
1844. Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc., V. I. 9. Pressing it down closely piece by piece with a small *crotch-stick.
1674–91. Ray, S. & E. C. Words, 94. A *Crotch-tail; a Kite; Milvus caudâ forcipatâ.
1865. Cornh. Mag., July, 41. ‘Crutch-tail’ formerly applied to a Kite.
1885. Swainson, Prov. Names Birds, 137. From its forked tail this bird [the Kite] has received the names of Fork tail, Crotch tail (Essex).
