A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (up to 1700)
Hide Quotations Hide Etymology
About this entry:
First published 2002 (DOST Vol. XI).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.
Tropic(k, n. [ME and e.m.E. tropik (Chaucer), tropick (1527), F. tropique, L. tropicus.] One of the two circles of the celestial sphere (here, the tropic of Cancer) which touch the ecliptic at the solstitial points where the sun reaches its greatest distance north or south of the equator. —1535 Stewart 3022.
Of signifer the greit obliquitie Fra Aries to Cancer gre be grie, Be intersit of equanocticall Fra the coluyre to tropic estiwall 1549 Compl. 37/28.
In the xxv degre of the sing of Gemini, distant fiue degreis fra oure symmer solstice, callit the borial tropic of Cancer 1699 Anal. Scot. I 356.
This day we past the tropick; and some of our seamen wer hoisted to the main yeard and let down 4 or 5 tymes in the sea & were brothered
