vee, noun

Forms:
vei, viehShow more Also vei, vieh, vij.
Origin:
DutchShow more Dutch, cattle.
1. obsolete. Livestock, especially sheep and goats.
1836 J. Collett Diary. I. 6 Dec.Set off this Morning up the Country to Purchase Vee for Slaughter.
1852 C. Barter Dorp & Veld 215 (Pettman)After the arrival of Mr. McCabe with his vee, the Kaffir labourers..made a feast on two of their master’s fattest sheep.
1877 Sel. Comm. Report on Mission to Damaraland 57I was not unwilling to..let them have a place for their vee and cattle.
1913 C. Pettman Africanderisms 529Vee, Cattle, but more frequently small stock, as sheep and goats, as distinct from beesten, cattle.
2. combinations
vee-boer /-buːr/, /-bʊə(r)/ [South African Dutch, boer farmer], (a) obsolete a cattle farmer; (b) in historical contexts, an early Dutch settler given permission to farm cattle in an area remote from the settlement at the Cape of Good Hope;
vee kraal /- krɑːl/ obsolete [South African Dutch, kraal enclosure, shelter], a shelter for livestock; a vee place;
vee place obsolete combination [South African Dutch veeplaats (plaats place) or Afrikaans veeplaas (plaas farm)], an outpost or part of a farm at which livestock was kept when a change of grazing was required;
vee post obsolete, vee place.
1824 S. Afr. Jrnl I. 29Poor Gert Schepers, a Vee Boer of the Cradock District, was less fortunate in an encounter with a South African lion.
1835 A. Steedman Wanderings I. 146We met with one of those graziers called by the Dutch a Vei Boor, who was removing with his flocks from the winter-veld to his summer residence.
1843 Chambers’s Jrnl (U.K.) in J.M. Bowker Speeches & Sel. (1864) 117The vee boers, far removed from the seat of authority and civilisation, have always been troublesome subjects.
c1885 M. Reid (title)The Vee-boers: a Tale of Adventure in Southern Africa.
1928 E.A. Walker Hist. of S. Afr. 62Long before the end of the seventeenth century, the frontier veeboer was in the process of becoming the trekboer.
1940 F.B. Young City of Gold 545Janse recognized among the prison-guard the Vee Boer, Trichard, who had given him his liberty after the fight at Bronkhorst Spruit.
1944 J. Mockford Here Are S. Africans 39The free burghers, the vee-Boers, rapidly acquired qualities unknown to the sedate residents of Table Valley.
1965 M.G. Atmore Cape Furn. 55As a result of the shortage of cattle for the Company, the third type came into being, the ‘veeboere’, on the outer perimeter of the wheat and wine farming belt.
1965 M.G. Atmore Cape Furn. 56Thus arose the ‘veeboere’, each tenant on some 6,000 acres of land.
1841 J.M. Bowker Speeches & Sel. (1864) 102A brother of Botman’s..stopped at our vee kraal begging goats.
1894 B. Mitford Renshaw Fanning’s Quest 96To look for half a dozen wretched sheep.., riding back by the vij-kraal to count Umsapu’s flock.
1913 J.J. Doke Secret City 23I, Piet Retief, had ridden back from the Vee Kraal at the close of a hot afternoon.
1931 V. Sampson Kom Binne 267Ian had gone off to the vee-kraal.
1818 G. Barker Journal. 3 Jan.Did a little in the garden & numbered the people at the Vee-place.
1838 J. Collett Diary. I. 28 Aug.Tracked to day to the Vee Place with Wether Flock.
1851 Godlonton & Irving Narr. of Kaffir War of 1850–51 123As the crisis approached, it was deemed prudent to bring in the flocks and herds from the ‘vee-places’ or out-stations.
1876 T. Stubbs Reminiscences. 39We arrived at the Vee place and found a lot more Dutchmen..there.
1887 A.A. Anderson 25 Yrs in Waggon II. 107They have their cattle-posts away in the bush, where the stock is looked after...These ‘vieh-posts’ are in charge of their slaves.
1931 V. Sampson Kom Binne 67This was the house flock and..they had another at the vee-post, which was a kraal around the hill, in charge of the separate herd, the object of the division being to distribute the good veld between the two flocks.
Livestock, especially sheep and goats.
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18181965