dung pilen.
/ˈdʌŋ pʌɪl/, U.S. /ˈdəŋ ˌpaɪl/ 1. A pile into which dung or farmyard manure has been gathered. Sometimes also more generally: a refuse heap, a midden. Cf. dunghill n.rare before later 19th cent.
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the world > physical sensation > cleanness and dirtiness > dirtiness > dirty place > [noun] > dunghill
mixenOE
dung heap?a1300
miskinc1300
muckhilla1325
dunghillc1330
muck-heapa1400
middena1425
modyngstretea1500
dung mixenc1500
laystowa1513
mixhill1552
muck midden1552
laystall1553
middenstead1583
layheap1624
dung pile1658
midden lair1692
thurrock1708
stercorary1759
midden stance1844
1658 J. Rowland tr. T. Moffett Theater of Insects in Topsell's Hist. Four-footed Beasts (rev. ed.) Ep. Ded. Oyl Beetles..rowl up and down a dung-pil.
1788 W. Marshall Rural Econ. Yorks. I. xxv. 408 Fill the hollow nearly full with mould,..leaving the surface somewhat dished; and within this dish set the dung-pile.
1871 Country Gentleman's Mag. Jan. 14/2 The midden or dung-pile is close to the door of the dwelling-house.
1898 E. Ellis Seaweed viii. 150 It do never do to stir a dung pile if 'ee've got a tender nose fur stinks.
1913 L. Kahlenberg & E. B. Hart Chem. & its Relation to Daily Life iv. 39 Ammonia..is found in stables, in dung piles, in the leachings from the latter, and in the soil.
1969 Brazil (Indiana) Daily Times 22 Aug. 4/5 Farmers..now find it cheaper and easier to scoop the fertilizer they need out of a bag than to dig it out of a dung pile.
2007 Aberdeen Press & Jrnl. (Nexis) 2 May 3 [The farmer] insists he has done nothing wrong and he is entitled to leave the dung pile in his own field.
2. A heap of droppings deposited by an animal or animals; spec. such a heap formed by an individual or group habitually defecating in the same place.
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1909 E. T. Seton Life-hist. Northern Mammals I. 636 A remarkable feature of the dung piles was a large mixture of crayfish remains.
1929 Jrnl. Mammol. 10 125 A large dung pile was located within four inches of the nest.
1971 Evening Standard (Uniontown, Pa) 14 Oct. 8/2 It is no longer policy to grab a man by the hair, push his face in dog-do and tell him to ‘clean this &?!];— dung pile off the &?!;— general's lawn.’
1979 J. Kingdom East Afr. Mammals III. b 151 The large dung piles made by Grevy's zebra might have both territorial and hierarchical functions.
2015 Sunday Tel. (Nexis) 28 June (Living section) 17 [Alpacas] defecate in a communal dung pile, which means they can be house-trained.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2018; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1658