Dictionaries of the Scots Language
Dictionars o the Scots Leid

A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (up to 1700)

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First published 1937 (DOST Vol. I).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

Claik, Clake, n.¹ Also: clayk, clack, cleck. [Of obscure origin.] The barnacle-goose. Also attrib. in claik guse. (See also Clack firr.) c1450-2 Howlat 212.
The archedene, that ourman, … Correker of kirkmen, was clepit the claik 1531 Bell. Boece I. p. xlviii.
Of the nature of claik geis, … Restis now to speik of the geis generit of the see, namit clakis. Sum men belevis, that thir clakis growis on treis [etc.] 1551 Acts II. 484/1.
The wylde guse of the greit bind … ij s.; the claik, quink, and rute … xviij d. 1553 Edinb. B. Rec. II. 184.
The best tame guis xx d., the best wyld guis … iij s., the clack and quynk xxviij d. 1596 Dalr. I. 60/21.
Of quhilkes is ane mekle les than the rest, that the claik guse we cal Ib. marg.
That guse is named claik quhilk is thocht to be bred of tries 1603 Monipennie Chron. N b.
At the mouth of the Riuer Clyde, … there are a number of claik-geese 1683 Coll. Aberd. & B. 102.
These two … gives occasion to that conjecture of this being a kind of the clack geese production a1700 Mare of Colinton in Watson's Coll. i. 48.
When the cleck geese leave off to clatter, And parasites to flietch and flatter