subs. (old colloquial).—1. A merry-making; any occasion for drinking: see quots. 1587, 1776, and 1847, and cf. WINE; (2) an ale-house. Hence ALECIE (or ALECY) = drunkenness; ALE-BLOWN (ALE-WASHED or ALECIED) = drunk; ALE-DRAPER (whence ALE-DRAPERY) = an innkeeper (GROSE: cf. ALE-YARD); ALE-SPINNER = a brewer; ALE-KNIGHT (ALE-STAKE, or ALE-TOAST) = a tippler, a pot-companion; ALE-POST = a maypole (GROSE); ALE-PASSION = a headache; ALE-POCK—an ulcered GROG-BLOSSOM (q.v.); ALE-CRUMMED = grogshot in the face; ALE-DAGGER (see quot. 1589); ALE-SWILLING = tippling, etc.
1362. LANGLAND, Piers Plowman [WRIGHT], 83.
| Faiteden for hire foode, | |
| Foughten at the ALE. |
1383. CHAUCER, The Canterbury Tales, ‘Frere’s Tale,’ 49. And maken him gret festes at the NALE.
1480. CAXTON, Description of Britain, 40.
| When they drynke atte ALE, | |
| They telle many a lewd tale. |
c. 1500. [HALLIWELL, Nugæ Poeticæ ‘The Debate of the Carpenter’s Tools,’ 19].
| When thei have wrought an oure ore two, | |
| Anone to the ALE thei wylle go. |
1570. Discoverie of the Knights of the Poste [HALLIWELL]. Nowe hee hath … become a draper. A draper, quoth Freeman, what draper, of woollin or linnen? No, qd he, an ALE-DRAPER, wherein he hath more skil then in the other.
1544. Supplication to Henry VIII., 41. Keepinge of church ALES, in the whiche with leappynge, daunsynge and kyssyng they maynteyne the profett of their churche.
1575. Records of the Ecclesiastical Records of Chester. [The Vicar of Whalley, Lanc., is charged with being a common dronker and ALE KNIGHT.]
1583. GOLDING, Calvin on Deuteronomy, li. 305. These tauernhaunters or ALEHOUSE-KNIGHTES.
1583. BABBINGTON, Works, 166. Gadding to this ALE or that. Ibid., 104. If he be a drunken ALE-STAKE, a tick-tack tauerner.
1587. W. HARRISON, The Description of England, I. II. i. 32 (1877). The superfluous numbers of idle waks … church-ALES, helpe-ALES, and soule-ALES, called also dirge-ALES, with the heathnish rioting at bride-ALES, are well diminished.
1589. Pappe with an Hatchet (1844), 8. He that drinkes with cutters, must not be without his ALE-DAGGER.
1595. SHAKESPEARE, Two Gentlemen of Verona, ii. 5. 61. Thou hast not so much charity in thee as to go to the ALE with a Christian. Ibid. (1599), Henry V., iii. 6. 82. ALE-WASHT wits. Ibid. (1609), Pericles, i. Introd. On ember-eves and holy ALES.
1592. CHETTLE, Kinde-Harts Dreame, 15. One in a sweating treble, the other in an ALE-BLOWEN base carowle out … ribaudry. Ibid. Two milch maydens that had set up a shoppe of ALE-DRAPERY. Ibid. No other occupation have I but to be an ALE-DRAPER.
1593. Bacchus Bountie [Harleian Miscellany (1809), II. 271]. A passing preseruatiue against the ALE-PASSION, or paine in the pate.
1594. J. LYLY, Mother Bombie, Cc. 9. If he had arrested a mare instead of a horse, it had beene a slight oversight, but to arrest a man, that hath no likenesse of a horse, is flat lunasie, or ALECIE.
1598. FLORIO, A Worlde of Wordes, s.v. Beâne. An ALE-KNIGHT, a toss-pot.
1598. E. GULPIN, Skialetheia (1878), 55. There brauls an ALE-KNIGHT for his fat-grown score.
1599. NASHE, Pierce Penilesse, His Supplication to the Divell, Eij. Elderton consumed his ALE-CRAMMED nose to nothing.
1601. HOLLAND, Pliny (1634), II. 128. Sauce-fleame, ALE-POCKS, and such-like ulcers in the face.
1602. The Life and Death of Thomas, Lord Cromwell, iii. 1. O, Tom, that we were now at Putney, at the ALE there!
1611. COTGRAVE, Dictionarie, s.v. Beste. Our ALE-KNIGHTS often use this phrase.
1617. ASSHETON, Journal (1848), 1. Besse, John, wyffe, self, at ALE.
1633. JONSON, A Tale of a Tub, Prol.
| And all the neighbourhood, from old records, | |
| Of antique proverbs, draw from Whitsun-lords, | |
| And their authorities, at Wakes and ALES. |
1635. TAYLOR (‘The Water Poet’), The Very Old Man; or The Life of Thomas Parr, Cij, b. T’a Whitson ALE, Wake, Wedding, or a Fair.
1654. Witt’s Recreations.
| Come all you brave wights, | |
| That are dubbed ALE-KNIGHTS. |
1655. YOUNGE, Charge against Drunkenness, 13. These godlesse ALE-DRAPERS.
1656. TRAP., Exp. 1 Tim. iii. 3. No ALE-STAKE, tavern-hunter that sits close at it.
1661. HEYLYN, History of the Presbyterians, 281. Nor do they speak any better of the Inferiour Clergy … of whom they tell us … That they are Popish Priests, or Monks, or Friars, or ALE-HAUNTERS.
1691. SHADWELL, Scourers, i. 1. Every night thou clearest the streets of … idle rascals, and of all ALE-TOASTS and sops in brandy.
1747. In Parish Register of Scotter, Lincolnshire. [Buried], July 8th, Thomas Broughton, Farmer and ALE DRAPER.
1776. BRAND, Observations on Popular Antiquities (1813) I. 229. [There were] Leet-ALE, Lamb-ALE, Whitson-ALE, Clerk-ALE, Bride-ALE, Church-ALE, Scot-ALE, Midsummer-ALE, &c.
1847. HALLIWELL, A Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words, etc., s.v. ALE-FEAST. A festival or merry-making, at which ALE appears to have been the predominant liquor, often took place after the representation of an old mystery, as in a curious prologue to one of the fifteenth century in MS. Tanner 407, f. 44.
1863–64. CHAMBERS’ Book of Days, ii. 597. This man was a regularly dubbed ALE-KNIGHT, loved barley wine to the full.
1870. Daily News, 28 Sept. There was a wining and dining, or better, a beering or ALEING and dining of the ‘Southern brethren.’
3. (stock exchange).—In pl. = Messrs. S. Allsopp and Sons Limited Shares.
See ADAM’S ALE.
