cramp-stone, the stone in a ‘cramp-ring’. Massinger, The Picture, v. 1.
cranewes, pl., embrasures between battlements; crannies, apertures. ‘Cranewes of the walls of the city’; North, tr. of Plutarch, M. Brutus, § 23 (in Shak. Plut., p. 131); id., M. Antonius, § 42 (in Shak. Plut., p. 222). OF. creneaux, pl. of crenel, a battlement, an embrasure, see Estienne, Préc. 358.
Cranion, a proper name given to a fly, the charioteer of Queen Mab; ‘Fly Cranion, her charioteer, Upon her coach-box getting’, Drayton, Nymphidia, st. 17. Sir Cranion-legs, thin legs, like a fly or spider; B. Jonson, Barth. Fair, i. 1 (Quarlous).
crank, lively, brisk, merry; also as adv.; ‘Joyeux, as crank as a cock-sparrow’, Cotgrave; Spenser, Shep. Kal., Sept., 46; Middleton, Trick to Catch the Old One, i. 3 (end); Beaumont and Fl., Wit at several Weapons, iii. 1 (Gregory); Sea-Voyage, iv. 3. 2. Crank is used in this sense in various parts of England, see EDD. (s.v. Crank, adj.2). Crankly, briskly, Peele, Tale of Troy (ed. Dyce, p. 552).
crank, a beggar who shams illness. Fletcher, Beggar’s Bush, ii. 1. 4. See Harman, Caveat, p. 51. Du. krank, ill, sick.
crank, to run in a winding course, to twist and turn about. Venus and Ad. 682; 1 Hen. IV, iii. 1. 98; a winding path, Coriolanus, i. 1. 143; cranks, pl. bends, turnings, Two Noble Kinsmen, i. 2. 28; Spenser, F. Q. vii. 7. 52.
crankle, to twist and turn about. Drayton, Pol. vii. 198; xii. 572; ‘Serpenter, to wriggle, wagle, crankle’, Cotgrave. A Leicestersh. word, see EDD. (s.v. Crankling).
†crapish (meaning unknown); ‘Scandalous and crapish’, Otway, Soldier’s Fortune, i. 1 (3 W.). Only in this place.
crash, a merry bout, a revel. Heywood, A Woman killed, i. 2. 5. See EDD. (s.v. Crash, sb.1 4).
cratch, a crib, manger; ‘The Coffin of our Christmas Pies in shape long is in imitation of the Cratch’, Selden, Table-talk (ed. Arber, 33); ‘Cratche for hors or oxen, creche’, Palsgrave; ‘Presepio, a cratch, a rack, a manger, a crib or a critch’, Florio. In prov. use in various parts of England, see EDD. (s.v. Cratch sb.1 1 and 2). ME. cracche (cratche), so Wyclif, Is. i. 3, and Luke ii. 7. OF. creche, O. Prov. crepia, crepcha (Levy).