Now dial. Also town’s end. The end of the main street of a town or village; one of the extremities of a town.
c. 1440. Alphabet of Tales, 330. Þe fflawme at had burnyd all þe town-end … sesid.
1591. Reg. Privy Council Scot., IV. 625. Quha … raid away with him oute at the toun end of Sanctandrois.
1818. Scott, Hrt. Midl., xxxi[i]. She’s fast in the stocks at Barkston town-end.
1886. S. W. Linc. Gloss., s.v., There’s a pinfold at the town-end.
1421. Coventry Leet Bk., 30. Ne þat no man … lay no dong at the townsend in no placys, but without the stakes … beyond the Frer gate.
1472. Paston Lett., III. 71. I have begonne to felle asshe at the townes ende.
1621. Sanderson, Serm. 1 Cor. vi. 24 § 21. Our idle sturdy rogues, and vagrant towns-end beggars.
1760–72. H. Brooke, Fool of Qual. (1809), IV. 55. Yonder church-yard below the town’s end.
