Now dial. Also 3–6 lugge, 8–9 lugg. [Of obscure etymology: there is no clear affinity of sense with LUG v. or LOG sb.1]
1. A long stick or pole; the branch or limb of a tree. (See also LOG sb.1 1 d.)
a. 1250. Owl & Night., 1609. An evereuch man is widh me wrodh, An me mid stone and lugge threteth.
1447. Yatton Churchw. Acc. (Somerset Rec. Soc.), 88. It. to Iohn Styvor makyng of to baner luggus … iiijd.
1567. Turberv., Epit., etc., 26 b. And from the bodies [of pines and oaks] the boughes and loftie lugges they beare.
1609. C. Butler, Fem. Mon., v. (1623), M. These sides are fitly made of inch-board, or of a cleaft Lug of Withie or other wood.
1795. Billingsley, Agric. Surv. Somerset (1797), 88. Covering the same with strong lugs or poles.
1853. Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc., XIV. II. 441. In Herefordshire the ordinary mode of gathering the fruit is by sending men to beat the trees with long slender poles or rods,… these poles are provincially termed ‘polting lugs.’
2. A measure a. of length: a pole or perch, varying according to local custom; usually of 161/2 feet, sometimes of 15, 18, 20, or 21 feet (? = great lug in quot. 1623).
1562–3. Act 5 Eliz., c. 4 § 11. What Wages every Woorckman … shall take … for ditching … by the Rodd, Perche, Lugg, Yard [etc.].
1590. Spenser, F. Q., II. x. 11. For the large leape which Debon did compell Coulin to make, being eight lugs of grownd.
1610. W. Folkingham, Art of Survey, II. iv. 52. Sixteen Foote 1/2 make a Pearch, Pole, or Lug.
1623. Boyle, in Lismore Papers (1886), II. 73. I paid … eight pounds ster: for every great Lugg of the playn worck of the town wall.
1681. Glanvill, Sadducismus, II. (ed. 2), 176. [He] followed the Apparition about ten Lugs (that is Poles) farther into the Copse.
1771. Antiq. Sarisb., 91. This [channel] was brought down … about 20 lug below the Bridge.
1813. T. Davis, Agric. Wilts, App. 268. A rod, pole, or perch … is of three lengths in this county: 15, 18, and 161/2 feet.
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Lug … in Gloucestershire, a land-measure of six yards.
b. of surface: a square pole or perch; † acre by lug = lug-acre (see 3).
1602. Burford Reg. (Hist. MSS. Comm.), Varr. Collect., I. 164. Mowinge of barley for every acre by lugge not above vd.
1727. Bradley, Fam. Dict., Acre, a Measure of Land, consisting of … an hundred and sixty square Lug or Perch of Land.
1772. Ann. Reg., 115. He had inclosed with a hedge about four lug of the land.
1794. J. Clark, View Agric. Herefordsh., 31. One standard is left to each forty-nine square yards, here called a lugg.
1845. Morn. Chron., 22 Nov., 5/2. I have seen a sack [of potatoes] a lug on some land,—that is 160 sacks per acre.
1885. Berksh. Vicar, in Standard, 17 Aug., 2/2. Allotments of twenty luggs each (i.e. one-eighth of an acre).
3. attrib. and Comb.: † lug-acre, an acre based on that value of the pole or perch to which the name lug was locally applied; † lug-fall, the length of a lug; a pole or perch.
1635. Burford Reg. (Hist. MSS. Comm.), Varr. Collect., I. 169. Wages…. For reaping and binding of wheate … for every *lugg aker not above ijs. vjd.
1863. J. Scott, Com. Bench Repts., XII. 91 [Somerset Law Case.] The right … to enter … upon a part or strip, to wit, a *lug fall [margin, A perch] of the said close.
