Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The offal of a deer.
- To remove the offal from, as deer.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun Offal of a deer.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun UK, rare The
entrails oroffal of a deaddeer . - verb UK, rare To
eviscerate adeer .
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
From Scottish Gaelic grealach ("entrails").
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Examples
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No, it was the gralloch prayer-I had seen the older man's eyes widen, and his glance at his sons as Jamie knelt over the carcass.
Drums of Autumn Gabaldon, Diana 1997
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It was the gralloch prayer he had been taught as a boy, learning to hunt in the Highlands of Scotland.
Drums of Autumn Gabaldon, Diana 1997
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"Say that again, you foul-mouthed dog o 'Fife, and I'll gralloch you like a deer!" cried the Chamberlain, his face tingling.
Doom Castle Neil Munro
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If they find you in Lochaber they will gralloch you like a Yule hind. "
John Splendid The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn Neil Munro
chained_bear commented on the word gralloch
"He had an apron in his knapsack and he put it on to gralloch his pig, because although he had no objection to a little blood on his clothes, Killick had..."
--Patrick O'Brian, The Nutmeg of Consolation, 14
A Sea of Words: "The viscera of a dead deer. To gralloch is to disembowel a deer." (218) Or, presumably in this case, a pig.
March 6, 2008
sionnach commented on the word gralloch
gralloch (verb): To disembowel a deer. From the Gaelic word for intestines. The existence of the term implies the prevalence of the act, which the author assumes to be one of the pastimes of the English upper classes, along with fox-chasing, train-spotting, and bird-murdering.
Source: The Superior Person's Book of Words (Peter Bowler)
February 3, 2009
chained_bear commented on the word gralloch
"He pulled the dirk from his belt and knelt by the deer, hastily saying the words of the gralloch prayer."
—Diana Gabaldon, Voyager (NY: Dell, 1994), 56
January 14, 2010