rangle

Stones or gravel eaten by birds of prey to improve digestion; gastroliths [from 17th c.]

Noun

  1. Stones or gravel eaten by birds of prey to improve digestion; gastroliths [from 17th c.]
    • Previously she was seen eating on 1 pigeon fledgling 2 days before swalling the rangle - 1982, Jorge L. B. Albuquerque, “Observations on the use of rangel by the Peregrine Falcon (Falco peregrinus tundrius) wintering in...

Verb

  1. To range about in an irregular manner.
    • Haue you not heard it long ago of cunning Fawkners tolde, / […] / And ſuch as knowe the luring voice of him that féedes them ſtill: / And neuer rangle farre abroade againſt the kéepers will, / Doe farre excéede the...
    • She bath’d her blade in blood up to the hilt, / And with the ſame their bodies all ſhe mangled, / All that abode her blowes, their bloud was ſpilt, / They ſcaped beſt that here and thither ranged,^([sic]) / Or thoſe...
    • The rangling rage that held from home Ulisses all too long, / Made chast Penelope complaine of him that did her wrong. - 1594, Henry Willobie, edited by Charles Hughes, Willobie His Avisa, London: Sherratt and Hughes,...

Origin

From range + -le (frequentative suffix).

Forms

rangles rangling rangled