Flat v.²

[f. FLAT a.]

  † 1.  trans. To lay flat or level, raze, overthrow (a person or building). Const. to, with (the earth or ground). Obs.

1607.  Tourneur, Revenger’s Trag., II. ii.

1611.  Speed, Hist. Gt. Brit., IX. v. 447. And thus those forts which were erected to defend the Crowne, first offended the King, some few whereof as he recouered, he flatted to the ground, and wished the other no higher walls.

1627–77.  Feltham, Resolves, I. iv. 5. When, like a Phœbean Champion, she hath routed the Army of her Enemies, flatted their strongest Forts, brought the mightiest of her Foes in a chained subjection, to humour the motions of her thronged Chariot, and be the gaze of the abusive World.

1637.  Heywood, Royall King, I. i.

  2.  Naut. To force (the sail) flat or close against the mast. Cf. FLAT a. 2 e. To flat in a sail (see quot. 1772); also absol.

a. 1642.  Sir W. Monson, Naval Tracts, III. (1704), 329/2. When he hears the Seamen cry, Starboard, or Port, or to bide Alooff, or flat a Sheet, or haul home a Cluling, the thinks he hears a barbarous Speech.

1667–70.  Davenant & Dryden, Tempest, I. i. Steph. Clap the Helm hard aweather! Flat, flat, flat in the Fore-sheet there.

1726.  Adv. Capt. R. Boyle, 25. Who flatted their Sails and laid by till the Spanish Ship came up with her.

1769.  Falconer, Dict. Marine, Aback, the situation of the sails when their surfaces are flatted against the masts by the force of the wind.

1772.  J. H. Moore, Pract. Navig. (1810), 275. To flat in, to draw in the aftermost lower corner or clue of a sail towards the middle of a ship, to give the sail a greater power to turn the vessel. To flat in forward, to draw in the fore-sheet, jib-sheet [etc.], towards the middle of the ship.

  † b.  intr. Of a ship: To turn her head from the wind; to go round on her keel. Obs.

1622.  R. Hawkins, Voy. S. Sea, § 34. 85. For in lesse then her length, shee flatted, and in all the Voyage but at that instant, shee flatted with difficultie.

  † c.  Of the wind: To abate, drop. Obs.

1748.  Anson’s Voy., III. i. 297. The wind flatted to a calm, and the ships rolled very deep.

  3.  trans. To make flat in shape. a. To reduce to a plane surface; to reduce or obliterate the convexity, projections, or protuberances of. b. To make broad and thin; to reduce the thickness or height of, esp. by pressure or percussion; to squeeze or beat flat. Also with down, out.

  Now chiefly in technical use; ordinarily FLATTEN.

  a.  1613.  M. Ridley, Magn. Bodies, 5. Egge forme flatted at the bottome.

1626.  Bacon, Sylva, § 477. If you take two Twigs of seuerall Fruit Trees, and flat them on the Sides, and then binde them close together, and set them in the ground, they will come vp in one Stocke.

1684.  R. Waller, Nat. Exper., 76. The Ball before freezing, was flatted so, that it would stand upon the bottom.

1697.  Creech, Manilius, IV. 979.

1803.  Fessenden, Terrible Tractoration, I. (ed. 2), 50, note. Let him to suppose that the earth was flatted near the poles, in the form of an oblate spheroid, and that a degree of latitude would, of consequence, be greater near the pole than at the equator.

1857.  Fraser’s Mag., LVI. Nov., 608/2. The smooth crisp curves about the breasts of our coats, which are so valued by our fine gentlemen, become cockled, flatted, and destroyed by the least moisture.

  b.  1651.  Evelyn, Mem. (1857), I. 285. The bullet itself was flatted, and retained on it the color of the gold.

1658.  Evelyn, Fr. Gard. (1675), 279. In drying them [Abricots] need you open them like Peaches; but leave them whole, only flatting them, that they may dry equally in every part, and be the more commodiously ranged in the Boxes.

1741.  Compl. Fam.-Piece, I. ii. 163. Make them into Loaves, and flat them down a little, or they will rise too much.

1774.  Goldsm., Nat. Hist., VIII. 99 (The Wasp). The composition is at length flatted out until it becomes a small leaf of a grey colour, much finer than paper, and of a pretty firm texture.

1780.  Von Troil’s Iceland, 356. Fishes, othoceratites, lituites, wood, &c. &c. which are to be found in slate, have been compressed or flatted, whilst they preserve their entire form and roundness in lime.

1837.  Marryat, Snarleyyow; or The Dog Fiend, lv. Smallbones was flatted to a pancake.

1884.  F. J. Britten, The Watch and Clockmakers’ Handbook, 128. In making a jewel hole, q suitable stone is selected and flatted to a proper thickness by holding it against a diamond mill which is kept wetted.

  c.  To spread or lay out flat.

1709.  Congreve, Ovid’s Art of Love.

  † 4.  intr. To become flattened. Of a swelling: To go down, lose its roundness. Obs.

1670.  Cotton, Espernon, I. III. 134. He receiv’d a Harquebuss-shot in his mouth, that passing through one of his cheeks, shatter’d his right jaw, and coming out his chin, flatted upon his Gorget.

1677.  Temple, Cure Gout, Wks. 1814, III. 260. I burnt it the second time, and upon it observed the skin about it to shrink, and the swelling to flat yet more than at first.

1725.  Huxham, Small-pox, in Phil. Trans., XXXIII. 393. His Pox flatted and grew pale, as likewise the Interstices: His Pulse was extreme languid, and he had a prodigious Tremor, with clammy Sweats.

  b.  U.S. To flat off: to slope gradually to a level. To flat out: to become gradually thinner. Hence fig. to fail in business; to prove a failure, to collapse, etc.

1859.  Bartlett, Dict. Amer., To Flat out, to collapse, to prove a failure … as ‘The meeting flatted out.’

1865.  Thoreau, Cape Cod, ix. 166. From the Clay Pounds the bank flatted off for the last ten miles to the extremity at Race Point, though the highest parts, which are called ‘islands’ from their appearance at a distance on the sea.

1865.  Holland, Plain Talk, iv. 129. Generally, disappointed and broken-down men are those who have failed in trade, or have run through some fancy scheme of gain, or, to use an expressive Yankee phrase, have ‘flatted out’ in a calling or profession which was intended to draw money in some way from the producing and commercial interests.

1887.  Proctor, Amer., in Knowledge, 1 June, 184/1. To flat out, to diminish in value—a Western phrase suggested by the diminished productiveness of metallic layers as they grow thinner.

  † 5.  ? To find the horizontal area of (land). Obs.

1770.  E. Heslerton Inclos. Act, 13. To flat, set out, and allot the lands.

†6.  trans. To render (wine, etc.) insipid or vapid.

1626.  [see FLATTED 4].

1694.  Westmacott, Scripture Herbal, 211. To demonstrate by what Principles Wines and Spirits are made, exalted, depressed, and flatted.

1703.  Art & Myst. Vintners, 11. The genuine Spirits of the Wine also are much flatted and impaired.

  † b.  To make dull or spiritless; to make less lively or vivid; to deaden, depress. Obs.

1648.  Eikon Bas., xvi. 141. Nor are constant Formes of Prayers more likely to flat, and hinder the Spirit of prayer and devotion, than unpremeditated and confused variety to distract and lose it.

1692.  Burnet, Past. Care, ix. 111. So great a Length does also flat the Hearers, and tempt them to sleep; especially when, as is usual, the first Part of the Sermon is languid and heavy.

1697.  Collier, Est. Mor. Subj., II. (1709), 90. Now you know any considerable Degrees of Sickness, or Age, flat the Senses, extinguish the memory, and weaken the Understanding: So that the Vigour of the Mind seems almost stifled under these Corporeal Oppressions.

1699.  Burnet, 39 Art., x. (1700), 118. Those Thoughts that answer it, arise oft and strongly upon us, till either that impression is worn out and flatted, or new and livelier ones are made on us by other Objects.

1710.  Norris, Chr. Prud., vi. 278. Then as to our selves there is as little reason upon that account too for using a multitude of words in our Prayers, which serve only to tire our Spirits, to distract our Attention, and make us wander and forget what we are about, and to flat and deaden our Devotion, without ministring any real advantage, or serving any reasonable End or Purpose.

  † c.  intr. To become dull, depressed or feeble; to droop, to slacken. Obs.

1654.  Fuller, Ephemeris, Pref. 5. Their loyalty flatteth and deadeth by degrees, when exposed to an unbounded Arbitrary power, so that they never know an end of their own obeying, but are in daily fear of new pressures from a lawlesse power, whose pleasure is all the reason of imposing them.

1692.  W. Temple, Memoirs, Wks. I. 448. The Hopes of those great Actions promis’d by the Imperialists this Summer on the Rhine began to flat, their Troops finding no Subsistence in those Countries.

a. 1718.  Penn, Maxims, Wks. 1726, I. 819. Our Resolutions seem to be vigorous, as often as we reflect upon our past Errors; But, alas! they are apt to flat again upon fresh Temptations to the same Things.

  † 7.  Music. To lower (a note) by one semitone.

1674.  [see FLATTING vbl. sb. 3].

1685.  Boyle, Effects of Mot., vii. 88. A determinate Note, (which he afterwards told me was Ce fa ut a little flatted).

(In some mod. Dicts.)

  8.  a. To cover (a surface) with flat, i.e., lustreless, paint. b. Carriage-building: To remove the gloss from (a surface) preparatory to varnishing. c. To apply a finish of size to (gilding) as a protection.

  a.  1842–76.  Gwilt, Archit., § 2290. The ceilings and cornices on ground and one-pair floor to be painted four times in oil, and flatted and picked in with such extra colours as may be directed.

1858.  Skyring’s Builders’ Prices, 95. Moulded Skirtings … If flatted, add 0¹/₂d.

1889.  Pall Mall G., 15 May, 1/2. Preferring to set it [a picture] on one side after it has been flatted in.

1879.  Cassell’s Techn. Educ., IV. 222/1. Apply a second coat of black Japan, and flat again. The whole should then be varnished with hard drying varnish, flatted down and finished.

  c.  1841.  in Maunder, Sci. & Lit. Treas.

  9.  U.S. colloq. To give a flat refusal to; to reject (a lover). Cf. FLAT sb. 16.

1859.  Bartlett, Dict. Amer., To flat, to reject a lover; as … ‘She flatted him.’

  10.  intr. To fish from a FLAT (sb.³ 9 a).

1630.  in Binnell, Descr. Thames (1758), 75. That every Hebberman shall fish by the Shore … and not to lie a Floating or Flatting for Smelts between two Anchors in the Midst of the Stream.