Dictionary

tenterbelly en · NOUN

Etymology

tenter ("to stretch") + belly.

Meanings

1. (obsolete) A glutton.
   • Bell, the famous Idoll of the Babylonians, was a meere imposture, a Iuggling toye, and a cheating bable, in comparison of this Nicholaitan, Kentish Tenterbelly, the high and mighty Duke All-paunch, was but a fiction to him. 1630, John Taylor, The Great Eater of Kent:
   • That amongst the drink-alians in tenterbelly, he that can drinke a certaine vessell of about a gallon thrice off, and goe away without indenting, for this his good service is presently carried through the City in triumph, to that goodly Temple dedicated to god All-paunch, and there knighted. 1638, Richard Younge, The Drunkard's Character:
   • Not with ſweet wine, mutton and potage, as many of thoſe Tenterbellies doe, howſoever they put on Lenten faces, and whatſoever they pretend, but from all manner of meat. 1628, Robert Burton, The Anatomy Of Melancholy:

Forms