hunger-belt, noun

girdle of famine, see girdle.
Note:
Recorded earlier in Australian English.
1864 T. Baines Explor. in S.-W. Afr. 467 (caption)Makalaka, with the first reef in his hunger-belt.
1865 Daily Telegraph (U.K.) 21 Dec. 7’Tis a device of savages to cheat an empty stomach and is called ‘the hunger belt’.
a1878 J. Montgomery Reminisc. (1981) 72I did not dress like one who wore the hunger belt from dire necessity, or one who was accustomed to soil his fingers. I thought a decent appearance would recommend me, but I was mistaken.
1913 C. Pettman Africanderisms 221Hunger-belt, A thong of hide (according to Krönlein the Namaqua words for hunger and for riem are from the same root, *a, to hunger), worn as a belt by the Namaqua Hottentots which in times of scarcity is gradually tightened to deaden the gnawings of hunger.
1968 G. Croudace Silver Grass 7Asa Riarua drew his hunger-belt tighter, feeling the richly-plaited leather biting into his stomach.
1968 G. Croudace Silver Grass 112Asa Riarua was in Herero dress: an aristocrat of other days, his beautifully-plaited hunger-belt drawn tight about his belly.
girdle of famine, see girdle.
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18641968
180-day, adjectiveadj.Hurutshe, nounn.
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