fat-tailed, adjective
a. In the n. phr. fat-tailed sheep (occasionally also fat-tailed ram), an indigenous hairy sheep with a large tail of solid fat; Cape sheep, see Cape sense 2 a. Occasionally elliptical, fat-tail. See also Afrikander noun sense 7, sheep’s tail fat.
- Note:
- The tails of these sheep, much prized for culinary purposes, were sometimes so heavy that they needed small wheeled carts or ‘tail trucks’ to support them (see quotation 1937).
[1598 J. Davys in R. Raven-Hart Before Van Riebeeck (1967) 20Their Sheepe have exceeding great tailes only of fat, weighing twelve or fourteene pounds: they have no wooll but a long shag haire.]
1989 Reader’s Digest Illust. Hist. of S. Afr. 21The fat-tailed sheep that were acquired by the Khoikhoi were in fact known in the Middle East about 4000 years before, when they were tended by Semitic-speaking people.
b. Having a large tail of solid fat.
1953 S. Afr. Stockbreeder & Farmer Ref. Bk 230The non-woolled sheep are mostly fat-tailed, e.g. the indigenous Namaqua and Ronderib Afrikaner, the Blackhead Persian and the van Rooy. Recently a non-woolled sheep without a fat tail, viz.: the Dorper, has been developed.
In the n. phr. fat-tailed sheep (occasionally also fat-tailed ram),an indigenous hairy sheep with a large tail of solid fat; Cape sheep, see Cape sense 2 a. Occasionally elliptical, fat-tail.
Having a large tail of solid fat.
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