1634 J. Levett Ordering of Bees 14 The Bees haue first brought out the Drone spat, and after that their owne spat.

1634 J. Levett Ordering of Bees 61 The spat or brood of the Bees are nourished by honey and water.

1657 S. Purchas Theatre Flying-insects 47 Their young is called spat, that which the bees spit forth or deliver by their mouth.

1925 Nature 26 Sept. 486/2 The spat falls in the three years 1922–24 were failures.

1963 Washington Post 2 Oct. b2 The 1963 fall of spat (young oysters) in the James River seed area has been inadequate to maintain seed stocks for the third successive year. This contrasts sharply with the above average spatfall throughout the rest of Virginia's Chesapeake Bay system.

1972 Aquaculture 1 258 The possibility of spatfalls must be recognized if the harbour were heavily stocked with this species.

1647 H. Hexham Copious Eng. & Netherduytch Dict. A Spat or an instrument that Chirurgions use in spreading their salves.

1656 T. Blount Glossographia Spat,..a little slice or Splatter, wherewith Surgeons and Apothecaries use to spread their plaisters and salves.

1866 Routledge's Every Boy's Ann. 180 A..version of racquets, with a ‘spat’ and an India rubber ball.

1706 Phillips's New World of Words (new ed.) Spat,..a kind of Mineral Stone.

1762 P. Murdoch tr. A. F. Büsching New Syst. Geogr. I. 41 Spat, or Spar, the species of which are cubic, flaky, granular Spat, and transparent Spat;..glass spat, and field spat.

1804 Repertory (Boston) 27 Apr. The late spat between Mr. Pitt and Mr. W. Pulteney.

1828 N. Webster Amer. Dict. Eng. Lang. Spat, a petty combat; a little quarrel or dissension. (A vulgar use of the word in New England.)

1869 H. B. Stowe Oldtown Folks 33 They was pretty apt to have spats.

1898 J. M. Henderson Chron. Kartdale, etc. 316 Robert and his uncle had a bit o' a spat this morning.

1823 Creevey in H. Maxwell Creevey Papers (1904) II. 62 The first sentence relating to Spain is a regular spat on the face to the Villains of Verona.

1831 Creevey in H. Maxwell Creevey Papers (1904) II. 231 I received rather a smartish spat on my shoulder from an unseen stick.

1840 Comic Lat. Gram. 23 More kicks, more boxes on the ear, more spats, more canings.

1899 Contemp. Rev. Dec. 881 An attention which she promptly requited by a ‘spat’ on the nose.

1881 M. H. Catherwood Craque o' Doom ix. 74 They heard the spat of boot-soles on the flinty pike behind them.

1893 C. King Foes in Ambush 110 The bullets with furious spat drove deep into the adobe.

1802 C. James New Mil. Dict. Spatts, a small sort of spatter~dashes, that reach only a little above the ancle, called also half gaiters.

1820 J. Hogg Shepherd's Cal. xiv Take in black spats, and a very narrow-brimmed hat, and you have the figure complete.

1863 A. Marsh Heathside Farm I. 28 Whose nether man was generally cased in brown spats (Anglice gaiters).

1888 Times (Weekly ed.) 16 Nov. 3/4 He wore a pair of dark spats with light buttons.

1931 Flight 16 Oct. 1047/1 (caption) The way in which the radius rod and axle are faired into the ‘spat’ is shown very clearly in these pictures.

1938 Jrnl. Royal Aeronaut. Soc. 42 442 I have noticed that wheels which have spats covering all but the lower portion often spin quite fast in flight.

1943 J. L. Hunt & A. G. Pringle Service Slang 61 If the wheels of a ‘spatted’ plane do not retract, it is said to have ‘permanent spats’.

1876 J. Weiss Wit, Humor, & Shakespeare ii. 47 When a skilfully distended bubble breaks, and only a thin spat of suds is left.

1897 M. Kingsley Trav. W. Afr. 258 Spats of mud..came flap, flap among the bushes covering me.

1922 J. Joyce Ulysses ii. viii. [Lestrygonians] 161 His gorge rose. Spaton sawdust, warmish cigarette smoke..the stale of ferment.

1948 T. A. M. Nash Anchau Rural Devel. & Settlement Scheme 6 Ankle deep in spat-out sugarcane fibre.

1968 Listener 11 July 40/1 It was generally conceived in the Labour movement that that old-fashioned and now spat-out word, ‘comradeship’, mattered an awful lot.

1978 A. J. Huxley Illustr. Hist. Gardening i. 10 Presumably growing from spat-out seeds, they [sc. wild fruits] were nearly always found close to the dwellings.

1667 T. Sprat Hist. Royal-Soc. 307 With a knife they gently raise the small brood [of oysters] from the Cultch, and then they throw the Cultch in again, to preserve the ground for the future, unless they be so newly Spat that they cannot be safely severed from the Cultch.

1667 T. Sprat Hist. Royal-Soc. 309 The Oysters are sick after they have spat.

1865 Rep. Sea Fisheries Comm. II. 1359/2 Some of the oysters..spat as late as the end of September. The general time of spatting, however, is much earlier.

1879 Cassell's Techn. Educator (new ed.) IV. 77/1 As oysters..have been known to spat very late in the year.

1634 J. Levett Ordering of Bees 25 The Bees both spat faster and preserve..their brood the better.

1634 J. Levett Ordering of Bees 61.

1809 E. A. Kendall Trav. Northern Parts U.S. III. 292 I was answered, ‘that the women had not much to say in politics, though now and then they would spat up’.

1848 J. R. Bartlett Dict. Americanisms Spat, to dispute; to quarrel.

1840 Comic Lat. Gram. 34 A caning... A spatting... A flogging.

1883 C. D. Warner Roundabout Journey 24 As I approached this sunken place I heard a tremendous spatting, and pounding, and chattering, and laughing.