subs. (colloquial).—A race with an equal finish. Formerly DEAD.

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  1635.  QUARLES, Emblems, Epig. 10.

        Mammon well follow’d; Cupid bravely led:
Both touchers; equal fortune makes a DEAD:
No reed can measure where the conquest lies:
Take my advice; compound, and share the prize.

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  1828–45.  HOOD, Poems, Miss Kilmansegg and Her Precious Leg vol. I., p. 170 (ed. 1846).

        Away! Away! she could ride a DEAD HEAT
With the DEAD who rides so fast and fleet.

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  1884.  Illustrated London News, 18 Oct., p. 362, col. 3. St. Gatien, the horse that ran a DEAD-HEAT for the Derby.

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