gleet

gleet

English

Alternative forms

• glit

Etymology

Old French glette.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɡliːt/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iːt

Noun

gleet (uncountable)

1. (obsolete, except Scots) Stomach mucus, especially of a hawk.
2. (obsolete, except Scots) Any slimy, viscous substance.
3. (vulgar, slang) A urethral discharge, especially as a symptom of gonorrhoea.
   • 1980, Anthony Burgess, Earthly Powers:

     There was this Estella, a real drab, being given syph and gon and gleet by Augustus John, and Tommy has her living with him in that place of his in Earl’s Court and going to a doctor, nothing wrong with her actually but there might well have been, and he never touches her, you know.

Verb

gleet (third-person singular simple present gleets, present participle gleeting, simple past and past participle gleeted)

1. To flow in a thin, limpid humour; to ooze, as gleet.
   • 1760, Alexander Mackenzie, "A remarkable Separation of part of the thigh bone" in Medical Observations and Inquiries, Volume 2, William Johnston, page 302:

     "upon dilating a ſmall gleeting hole about three inches above the knee, on the outside of the thigh; and introducing a jointed or ſcrew probe, I found the bone carious to ſuch a height and withal the patient ſo emaciated with the tedious diſcharge, and a hectic fever that I diſſuaded attempting the operation"

   • 1676, Richard Wiseman, Severall Chirurgical Treatises

     The Lips of the Abscess digested well, but from within it only gleeted, and thrust out Fat

2. To flow slowly, as water.
   • 1705-1715, George Cheyne, The Philosophical Principles of Religion Natural and Revealed

     gleet down the rocky Caverns of these Mountains

References

gleet in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913

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Scots

Noun

gleet (uncountable)

1. Stomach mucus, especially of a hawk.
2. Any slimy, viscous substance.