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shire

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shire

  [shahyuhr]
Use shire in a Sentence
–noun
1. one of the counties of Great Britain.
2. the Shires, the counties in the Midlands in which hunting is especially popular.
Origin:
bef. 900; ME; OE scīr office of administration, jurisdiction of such an office, county
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Shire

  [shahyuhr]
–noun
one of an English breed of large, strong draft horses having a usually brown or bay coat with white markings.
Origin:
1875–80; appar. so called because it was bred in the shires, i.e., those counties of west and central England whose names end in -shire

Shi⋅ré

  [shee-rey]
–noun
a river in SE Africa, flowing S from Lake Malawi to the Zambezi River. 370 mi. (596 km) long.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
Cite This Source Link To shire
shire   (shīr)   
n.  

  1. A former administrative division of Great Britain, equivalent to a county.

  2. often Shire A Shire horse.


[Middle English, from Old English scīr, official charge, administrative district.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Word Origin & History

shire 
O.E. scir "administrative office or district," from P.Gmc. *skizo (cf. O.H.G. scira "care, official charge"). Ousted since 14c. by Anglo-Fr. county (q.v.). The gentrified sense is from The Shires (1796), used by people in other parts of England of those counties that end in -shire; sense transferred to the hunting country of the Midlands (1860).
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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Encyclopedia

Shire

draft horse breed native to the middle section of England. The breed descended from the English "great horse," which carried men in full battle armour that often weighed as much as 400 pounds. Shires were improved as draft and farm animals in the latter part of the 18th century by breeding mares from Holland to English stallions. In 1853 the first Shire was imported to the United States, but the breed never became popular there and was primarily bred to upgrade smaller farm horses

Learn more about Shire with a free trial on Britannica.com.

Encyclopedia Britannica, 2008. Encyclopedia Britannica Online.
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