sark

plural sarks

1. archaicA garment worn against the torso, inclusive of shirts, tunics, undershirts, nightshirts, surplices.

   Near is the kirtle, but nearer the sark.

2. Northern EnglandScotlandSynonym of shirt, whether worn against the skin or not.

   The next thing the watchers saw was the laird struggling up the far bank and casting his coat from him, so that he rode in his sark.

   1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide

   1 more example

   Then lorek's rear claws dug into the links of Iofur's chain-mail sark and ripped downward. The whole front came away, and Iofur lurched sideways to look at the damage, leaving lorek to scramble upright again.

   2007, Philip Pullman, His Dark Materials, Bluefire, →ISBN, page 259

   Synonyms: shirt, whether worn against the skin or not

present singular third person sarks · participle present sarking · participle past sarked · past sarked

1. transitiveTo cover with sarking, or thin boards.

1. An island of the Bailiwick of Guernsey, Channel Islands.

1. A minor river in Dumfries and Galloway council area and Cumbria, forming part of the border between Scotland and England, which flows into the tidal Esk at Gretna; in full, the River Sark.

   I have often been amused by travellers pointing out, first the Eden, just north of the station, and then the Esk, which young Lochinvar swam, as the Border; the real boundary is, of course, the little river Sark, just south of the Caledonian station at Gretna; […].

   1953 August, Basil M. Bazley, “Carlisle in 1905”, in Railway Magazine, page 507