moiley - From Ulster to America
Source: From Ulster to America: The Scotch-Irish Heritage of American English
Author: Michael Montgomery
Comments: From Ulster to America recounts the lasting impact eighteenth-century settlers from Ulster have made on the development of the English language of the United States. The book documents over 500 vocabulary items contributed to American English by these ‘Scotch-Irish’ settlers. Each ‘shared’ term with its meaning is authenticated by quotations from both sides of the Atlantic. This searchable online version of his book takes its text from the dictionary part of the second edition published by the Ullans Press in 2017.
moiley, moily, moulleen, moyley, moylie (all only in Ulster); mooley, muley (both only in the U.S.) n A hornless cow, goat or ox. [of Celtic origin (cf Irish maolaí or Scottish Gaelic maolag/maolán (from maol ‘bald, hornless’); oed moiley adj 1 Scottish and Anglo-Irish, muley now chiefly U.S.; snd moyley; dare muley adj widespread except Atlantic Coast; the form muley is probably U.S. folk etymology from similarity of headshape to a mule]
Ulst.:
1880 Patterson Antrim/Down Glossary 69 moily = a hornless cow.
1904 Byers Sayings of Ulster 39 Of a constant talker some one may allege ‘He’d talk the horns off a moily cow’.
1937 Rowley Tales of Mourne 216 My mother was a widow; she had a nice bit of a farm up in Moneydarragh, an’ she had a wee moiley cow was the apple of her eye.
1942 Bangor Words 55 = bare head, no horns (a moyley goat or a moyley cow is hornless).
c1955 Montgomery Heard in Ulster 82 moily = a cow naturally without horns, or a moily goat.
1959 Gregory Ulster Ballads 7 Plaze dinnae let him lift wee stones / Tae clod the gander or the goat, / … Or dandher near the moylie cows, ; Or roanies, / wi’ the crumpled horns.
1969 Braidwood Ulster Dial Lex 31-32 The word is derived from Irish moilin, ‘a hornless cow’, from maoile ‘baldness, bareness’. I am informed by Dr. W. N. Scott, Assistant Librarian in the University, that the term ‘moiley’ is applied to a specific breed of cattle, the ‘Irish moiled’, formerly wide-spread in Ireland. It was a coarse-framed, deep-bodied, short-legged, naturally hornless type, coloured red, red and white, or red roan, and was capable of producing a high yield of milk.
2014 Fenton Hamely Tongue 157 moily = a hornless cow (originally of a special breed, but used generally).
U.S.: (also muley cow).
1909 Payne Word-list East Alabama 351 muley(-cow) = a hornless cow.
1930 Shoemaker 1300 Penn Words 40 muley = a hornless, or dehorned cow.
1962 Dykeman Tall Woman 48 Come on, Robert, let’s get our little muley-cow to work again.
1968 Vincent Best Stories 44 This cow ain’t got no horns. She’s a muley.
1970 Justus Tales Missy, the muley cow, was a great pet of Mammy’s.
