Sc. and north. dial. Forms: (1 cest, cist, cyst), 3–5 kiste, 4– kist, (4–6 kyst(e, 4 kystte, 6 keste). [Northern form of CHEST sb.1; either directly from Scandinavian, or owing its form to Norse influence: cf. ON. kista, Sw. kista, Da. kiste; also Du. kist, Ger. kiste. With the various senses, cf. CHEST 1, 3, 4, 5.]
1. A chest, box, coffer. (In Sc. the specific term for a servant’s trunk.)
c. 1300. Havelok, 2018. Al þat he milhen [= hy mihten] fynde Of hise, in arke or in kiste.
13[?]. E. E. Allit. P., C. 159. Ouerborde bale to kest,… Her kysttes & her coferes.
c. 1420. Sir Amadace (Camden), xliv. Kistes and cofurs bothe ther stode,… fulle of gold precius and gode.
1535. Stewart, Cron. Scot., II. 21. All tha buikis tha kist hes brocht till.
1792. A. Wilson, Watty & Meg, in Chambers’ Pop. Hum. Scot. Poems (1862), 82. On a kist he laid his wallet.
1825. Brockett, Kist, a chest.
1866. Engel, Nat. Mus., viii. 272. The instances where an organ—or ‘a kist o’ whistles,’ as this noble instrument has been termed—has gained favour in a Scotch congregation, are exceptional.
1888. Pall Mall Gaz., 9 June, 3/2. It bears the strongest family resemblance to carvings on the old Cumberland kists.
† b. Applied to the ‘ark’ of bulrushes in which Moses was placed; and to Noah’s ark. Obs.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 5614–7 (Cott.). A rescen [MS. An esscen] kyst [Gött. a kist of rises] sco did be wroght,… In þis kist þe barn sco did.
13[?]. E. E. Allit. P., B. 449. ‘Now Noe,’ quoth oure lorde, ‘…Hatz þou closed þy kyst with clay alle aboute?’
2. A basket. (Cf. CHEST sb.1 4.)
1724. in Ramsay Tea-t. Misc. (1733), I. 29. Ane auld kist made with wands, And that sall be your coffer.
1861. Clington, F. O’Donnell, 35. Servant maids … were collected around a kist or basket of potatoes … peeling them for the colcannon.
3. A chest or place in which money is kept; a treasury; also transf. the store of money itself.
1619. Fletcher, Loy. Subj., III. iii. When the kist increased not.
1816. Scott, Antiq., xxiv. Yon kist is only silver, and I aye heard that Misticot’s pose had muckle yellow gowd in ’t.
4. A coffin; a stone coffin or sarcophagus.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 21018. Siþen was his bodi … laid in kist o marbil stan.
c. 1450. St. Cuthbert (Surtees), 3439. Þar ligges a kist on þe north syde.
a. 1555. Lyndesay, Tragedie, 266. Thay Saltit me, syne cloist me in ane kyste.
1596. Dalrymple, trans. Leslie’s Hist. Scot., VII. 35. In a kist of leid he is laid.
1721. Kelly, Sc. Prov., 6. A’ that you’ll get will be a kist and a sheet after all.
1855. Robinson, Whitby Gloss., s.v., ‘A kirk garth kist,’ a churchyard chest, a coffin.
1853. Phillips, Rivers Yorksh., viii. 208. In a conspicuous barrow … The kist contained a female skeleton.
1866. Laing, Preh. Rem. Caithn., 45. This kist contained an extended male skeleton with a rude flint spear-head.
1866. G. Stephens, Runic Mon., I. 255. In this kist lay 4 glazed pots or urns of several sizes, full of ashes and bones and charcoal.
Hence Kistful, as much as fills a kist.
c. 1644[?]. Lesly’s March, in Scott, Minstr. Scott. Bord. The kist-fou of whistles, That mak sick a cleiro.
1816. Scott, Antiq., xxiv. Sic another kistfu’ o’ silver.
