Ar. Safely in harbour / Is the Kings ſhippe, in the deepeNooke, where once / Thou calldſt mevp at midnight to fetch dewe / From the ſtill-vextBermoothes, there ſhe's hid; [...]
You must note, that twoFardells of Land make aNooke of Land, and two Nookes make halfe aYard of Land.
1903,English Dialectical Dictionary, volume IV, page295:
Nook, an old legal term for 12+1⁄2 acres of land; still in use at Alston.
1968 November 9,The Economist, page 2:
They poured their wine by theaume or thefust, and cut their cloth by thegoad—not to be confused with thegawd, which was a measure of steel. Theirnook was not cosy; it covered 20 acres.
1777, Joseph Nicolson,Richard Burn, “[Appendix.] No. XXVIII. Penrith Boundary on the Side of Caterlen.”, inThe History and Antiquities of the Counties of Westmorland and Cumberland.[...] In Two Volumes, volume II, London: Printed forW[illiam] Strahan; andT[homas] Cadell,[…],→OCLC,pages546–547:
The ancient bounds of the cow paſture ofPenrith, [...] and then from the ſaid Old Dyke end, alongſt Plumpton Dyke Eaſt over Petterel unto Plumpton parknuke, otherwiſe called Plumptonnuke; [...]
1827,John Hodgson, “Morpeth Deanery”, inA History of Northumberland, in Three Parts, part II, volume I, Newcastle upon Tyne: Printed by Edw[ard] Walker, forJ[ohn] B[owyer] Nichols, [et al.],→OCLC, footnote b,page 2:
The bounder beginneth at the eastnuke of the Carter, and from thence extendeth eastward upon the height of the edge to Robscleugh Score, and from thence to Phillip's cross, so to the Spittopnuke, from thence to Greenlaw, so to the height of the Brown Hartlaw, and from thence along the high street to thenuke of the Blakelaw, and from thence to Hemmier's Well, where Ridsdale and Cookdale meet, all weh is a bounder against Scotland.
Mrs. Fluent wasnooked with their hostess in the corner of another, a retiring woman, remarkably pretty withal, as your ministers' wives generally are, and no wonder, since the ministers, if at all popular, usually have their pick among the young lambs — we mean the young ladies — of their flocks.
1855, Charles Rogers,The modern Scottish minstrel:
'Tis the marrow of health In the forest to lie, Where,nooking in stealth, They enjoy her supply
1905,Appleton's Magazine - Volume 5, page847:
The author of Aunt Jeannie, the play in which Mrs. Patrick Campbell has starred, makes one of his characters say : " Half the time you werenooking with Daisy, the rest with Mrs. Halton.
1860, Jedediah Vincent Huntington,A Tale of Real Life, Or, Blonde and Brunette, page 8:
The city of Gotham is an island, as we have said; and once it was a beautiful island, affording to the gaze of him who sailed along its shores, an agreeable mixture of rock and grove, topping hill and marshiy low ground, spakling here and there with the villas or country-houses of the wealthy Gothamites, mostly built of wood painted white, and adorned with long verandahs quite encircling them; or showing at some turn a humbler, but substantial abode,nooked under a mighty horse-chestnut, the headquarters of a milk-farm, with cattle (whose tinkling bells you could hear in the still evening) grazing on its wild up-hilly pasture-land.
2009, Karen Marie Moning,Beyond the Highland Mist:
Stairs descended to larders, pantries were cleverlynooked into alcoves, and beyond the open windows sprawled lush gardens.
2014, Lois Leveen,Juliet's Nurse, page233:
There are yet more hivesnooked into the very walls that encircle the city, and tucked in trees that edge the fields beyond the walls.
2018, George de Horne Vaizey,The Lady of the Basement Flat, page64:
I think she saw that I was disappointed, and a trifle shy at going alone, so off we went together —Charmion a marvel of unobtrusive elegance in grey, and I "taking the eye” in sapphire-blue—along the breezy lane, past the closed gates of Uplands, through the shuttered High Street into the tiny square, in a corner of which the church wasnooked, with the vicarage garden adjoining the churchyard.
^“Nook” in John Walker, A Critical Pronouncing Dictionary[…], London: Sold by G. G. J. andJ. Robinſon, Paternoſter Row; and T.Cadell, in the Strand, 1791,→OCLC, page 361, column 3.
