searce

Meanings

nounsearce (plural searces)

plural searces · alternative sarse

countableobsoleteA sieve; a strainer.
Yet will our selfe overweening sift his divinitie through our searce [translating estamine]: whence are engendred all the vanities and errours wherewith the world is so full-fraught[…].
1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 12, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC

verbsearce (third-person singular simple present searces, present participle searcing, simple past and past participle searced)

present singular third person searces · participle present searcing · participle past searced · past searced · alternative sarse

obsoleteTo sift (through a sieve); to bolt.
My next Difficulty was to make a Sieve, or Searſe, to dreſs my meal, and to part it from the Bran and the Huſk, without which I did not ſee it poſſible I could have any Bread. […] I had nothing like the neceſſary Things to make it with—I mean fine thin Canvas, or Stuff, to ſearſe the Meal through.
1719 May 6 (Gregorian calendar), [Daniel Defoe], The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, […], London: […] W[illiam] Taylor […], →OCLC, page 144

Origin

Late Latin*saetāceus“(cloth) made of bristles”
Old Frenchsaas
Late Latin*circa
Anglo-Normancerche
Middle Englishsarse
Englishsearce

From Middle English sarse, probably from Anglo-Norman cerche, *cerce, from Late Latin *circa. Traditionally derived from Old French saas (Late Latin *saetāceus (pannus) (“(cloth) made of bristles”)), but this does not explain the -r- or the final -e of the Middle English form; intrusive -r- before /s/ is sometimes found in Middle English, but one would expect etymological r-less forms to appear alongside such forms.

More words from Middle English, Anglo-Norman, Late Latin

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