Also 5 swengyl, swyngel, -il, -yl(l, swangul-, sungylle-, 5–6 swyngell, 6 swyngle, 7 swingow, 6–9 swingell, 9 local swindgel(l, swingel, -jel. [a. MDu. swinghel swingle for flax, corresp. in form to OE. swingell, -el(l)e, swingle stroke or stripe with a rod, etc., whipping, scourging, chastisement, affliction, scourge, whip, also once, swingle or distaff (transl. colus), f. SWING v.1 + -LE 1; or partly a. (M)LG. swengel bell-clapper, pump-handle, swipe, MDu. swenghel swipe, Du. zwengel swingle, MHG. swengel (G. schwengel swipe, bell-clapper, swingletree, etc.):—*swaŋgwil-, f. swaŋgw- (see SWING v.1). Some forms (swengyl, swangull, sungylle) show divergent stem-vowels the immediate source of which is not clear.]
1. A wooden instrument resembling a sword, used for beating and scraping flax or hemp so as to cleanse it of woody or coarse particles; also called swingle-hand, -staff, or -wand, swingling-bat, -knife, or -staff.
c. 1325. Gloss. W. de Bibbesw., in Wright, Voc., 156. Le pesselin, the swingle.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 482/2. Swengyl, for flax or hempe, excudium.
c. 1462. Wright’s Chaste Wife, 216. I haue both hempe and lyne … And a swyngyll good and grete. Ibid., 387. Sche brought a swyngyll att þe last.
1847. Jrnl. R. Agric. Soc., VIII. II. 446. The swingle or scutching tool.
1850. J. Warner, Flax v. Cotton, 13. The first blow of the swingle is the commencement of wages.
2. The striking part or swipple of a flail. local.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 482/2. Swengyl, of a fleyle or oþer lyke, feritorium.
1547. Salesbury, Welsh Dict. Fustwial, a swyngell.
1570. Foxe, A. & M. (ed. 2), III. 2233/2. A blow with the swingell of a flayle.
1821. Clare, Vill. Minstr. (1823), I. 90. While distant thresher’s swingle drops With sharp and hollow-twanking raps.
a. 1825. Forby, Voc. E. Anglia.
1889. F. Lucas, Sk. Rural Life, The Tasker, xvi. Then let our floors send up the sound Of the swinjel’s measured stroke.
b. A weapon resembling a flail; a kind of cudgel.
1818. W. Chafin, Cranbourn Chase, 35. They [sc. deer-stealers] came in the night, armed with deadly offensive weapons called swindgels, resembling flails to thresh corn.
1904. Daily News, 7 Nov., 9. The keeper drew a ‘swingle’ round his legs, bringing him to the ground.
1905. J. C. Cox, Royal Forests Eng., 84. Helmets and swindgel of the deer hunters of Cranbourn Chase.
† 3. The clapper of a bell. Obs. rare–0.
14[?]. Voc., in Wr.-Wülcker, 567/39. Batillus, a belle clapere vel a swyngell.
4. a. A spoke or lever for turning the barrel in wire-drawing or the roller of a plate-press. b. A crank.
1674. Ray, Coll. Words, Wire working, 133. Underneath is fastened to the barrel a spoke of wood, which they call a Swingle which is drawn back a good way by the calms or cogs in the Axis of the wheel, and draws back the barrel which falls to again by it’s own weight.
1787. Marshall, Rural Econ. Norfolk (1795), II. Gloss. (E. D. S.), Swingle, sb. a crank.
1875. Knight, Dict. Mech.
