Now techn. Forms: 5 ter, 5–6 tere, 5–7 teer(e, 6 teir, teyre, 7 teare, 7–8 tare, 7– tear. [Known c. 1400; app. from Du. or LG.: cf. MDu., MFl., MLG., LG. teer, têr, contracted from teeder, têder fine, thin, delicate, tender: cf. OE. tíedre, týdre, tydder tender.]
† A. adj. Fine, delicate; of the best quality. (Said esp. of flour and hemp.) Obs.
c. 1400. Trevisa’s Higden (Rolls), III. 9. Salomon his mete was euery day þritty corues of clene [v.rr. teer, tere, ter] floure and foure score corues of mele.
1501. Douglas, Pal. Hon., I. 542. Damisflure, tere pyle, quhairon thair lyis Peirle, Orphany quhilk euerie stait renewis.
1532. Test. Ebor. (Surtees), VI. 34. ij pare of harden shettes, ij pare of hempe tere, and ij pare of lynan shettes. Ibid. (1544), 214. A pare of newe hempe tere shetes.
1541–2. in Lanc. Wills (1857), 80. A xj payre of teir hempen shetis.
B. sb. (The adj. used absol.) Something of the finest or best quality: † a. The finest wheaten flour. Obs. b. The finest fiber of flax or hemp.
a. c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 489/1. Teere, of flowre, amolum.
1521. Whitinton, Gram., B vj. Pollis vel pollen … est idem in tritico quod flos in siligine, the tere of floure.
1521. Coventry Leet Bk., 669. But on haly-cake, and that they put no more theryn but the Teyre of thre stryke of whete.
b. 1541–2. in Lanc. Wills (1857), 81. xxv teir of hempe slippingis.
1601. Holland, Pliny, XIX. i. As for the good Flax indeed, which is the teere or marrow as it were within of the Line.
1657. W. Coles, Adam in Eden, cclxxxi. The Summer Hemp affordeth most Teere as they call it.
1706. Phillips (ed. 6), Tare of Flax, the finest dress’d part of it made ready for the Spinner.
1805. Usef. Proj., in Ann. Reg., 851/2. A machine for discharging a woolcomb or combs, by separating the tears from the noiles.
1837. Whittock, etc., Bk. Trades (1842), 238. (Flax Dresser) The strike is to pass through a fine hackle, and the hurds coming from thence saved for middling cloth, and the tear itself for the best linen.
