[Cf. SPLINT sb. 8.] Coal with a more or less splintery fracture; orig. a less bituminous variety of Scotch cannel coal; now chiefly, a hard and highly bituminous coal burning with great heat.
α. 1789. J. Williams, Min. Kingd., I. 109. In this line the splent coal, &c. has been worked.
1801. Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3), Suppl. II. 231/2. A specimen of the slaty kind [of cannel coal] from Airshire, called splent coal.
1815. Aikin, Min. (ed. 2), 61. Candle Coal. Cannel Coal Splent Coal.
β. 1839. Ure, Dict. Arts, 963. I found good splint coal of the Glasgow field to have a specific gravity of 1·266.
1861. Sir W. Fairbairn, Iron, 75. It is well known that the anthracite and splint coal can be used most effectively and economically with the hot-blast.
attrib. 1887. P. M‘Neill, Blawearie, 92. We remember … traversing one [mine] in the splint coal seam barely two and a half feet wide.
