leasow
verbEtymology From Middle English leesewe, lesewe, leswe, from Old English lǣs (“pasture”), from Proto-West Germanic *lāsu (“pasture”).
leasow
noun/ˈliːzəʊ/
Etymology From Middle English leesewe, lesewe, leswe, from Old English lǣs (“pasture”), from Proto-West Germanic *lāsu (“pasture”).
1
Archaic, Dialectal, Historical (Green) land as opposed to flood or desert; a pasture.
- Reflexions in her Book, strike one as a Statue does among the tangled Thickets of the Leasowes […].1803 July 25, Hester Piozzi, Thraliana:
- The oxen which are brought on in succession, run the first summer in the park, and in the leasows and temporary straw-yards in the winter; [...]1826, Thomas Gill, The Technical repository:
2 more examples
- Lords could create a leasow by fencing off part of their demesne, if it was held in a block rather than being scattered over the fields and intermingled with the land of tenants.2012, Christopher Dyer, A Country Merchant, 1495-1520:
- Imprimis we do present upon our oaths that one Gilbert Wheeler gentleman enclosed a leasow called the Hide containing 20 acres which was common about 10 years past with the fields there.2013, Eric Kerridge, Agrarian Problems in the Sixteenth Century and After: