a1333 Gloss. W. de Bibbesworth (BL Add.) (1929) 12 Of dravelynge [a1325 Cambr. fro slavering; glossing Fr. de baavure].

1514 Inquest R. Hunne in J. Foxe Actes & Monuments (1563) 391/2 His eyen and mouth fayre closed..without any dreuelyng or spurginge in any place of his body.

1595 W. Phiston tr. Schoole Good Manners sig. C4 Nay which is most loathsome, with sniueling of their nose, and driueling of their mouth.

1739 J. Douglas Diss. Venereal Dis. Pt. III 146 A slight (or great) fever (as it may happen) with a rash all over the body, and a drivelling (i.e. spitting five or six pints a day) for a sufficient time.

1822 J. M. Good Study Med. I. 461 The coryza, or snuffling of old age, is precisely analogous to its ptyalism or drivelling.

1895 Ninth Biennial Rep. Kansas State Board Agric. 425 The animal's nose protrudes, and there is a driveling of saliva from the mouth.

2000 Mirror (Nexis) 13 May 6 It's an absolute fact that the day after the Baftas in Cardiff, if you own a dry cleaning shop you are a millionaire, because people send in clothes that are covered in spittle from a night of drivelling.

c1350 Nominale (Cambr. Ee.4.20) in Trans. Philol. Soc. (1906) 9* De bouche sue bauet, fro the mouth wipith drauelynge.

a1398 J. Trevisa tr. Bartholomaeus Anglicus De Proprietatibus Rerum (BL Add. 27944) (1975) I. vii. lxvii. 430 Ȝif his [sc. a woode houndes] dreuelinge falliþ in watir hit infectiþ þe watir.

1698 G. Dampier in Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) 20 51 A Dog had gotten in amongst a whole Heard of Cattel..and had bitten some, which growing Mad, and feeding together with their Fellows, when Mad, the Driveling of them infected many more.

1768 J. Potter Gayton's Festivous Notes Don Quixote ii. i. 63 The combatants were stags of mettle; for as on each side of an isthmus, by the iterated beatings and rebeatings of the sea, the salt froth and spirituous bubbles float to the shore; so upon this Pharsalian plain, the drivelings of these embossed rivals..were as visible.

OE Antwerp-London Gloss. (2011) 104 Seumaticus [read reumaticus], saftriende uel drefliende.

1530 J. Palsgrave Lesclarcissement 311/1 Drivelyng as a yonge chylde, baueux.

1552 R. Huloet Abcedarium Anglico Latinum Driuelynge harlot or queane, scraptia.

1608 J. Sylvester tr. G. de S. Du Bartas Deuine Weekes & Wks. (new ed.) ii. iv. 118 Stooping as shee goes, With driveling mouth, and with a sniveling nose.

1790 T. Marryat Philos. Masons xi. 197 Not one in a million of those who arrive at maturity, either spend their time to better purpose or are much more enlightened than the drivelling infant.

1890 W. O. Tristram Locusta ii. viii. 276 The winecup's course to the drivelling mouth was stayed.

1998 T. G. Parkin in P. Johnson & P. Thane Old Age from Antiq. to Post-modernity ii. 32 The shaky voices and limbs of the elderly, their bald heads and drivelling noses.

1570 J. Drout Pityfull Hist. Two Louing Italians sig. Aviii^v Gaulfrydo could not speake bicause all smyred was his face, With driueling drops of lukewarm teares which trickled downe a pace.

1624 J. Gee Foot out of Snare (new ed.) 58 There escaped at that time some drops of Milke from Fulbertus his lips, he hauing forgot to sucke,..and those driueling droppes are they which are kept in a siluer Image of the Virgin Mary.

1804 Naval Chron. 12 473 Gusts of wind and drivelling sleet.

1994 Nation (N.Y.) 27 June 919/2 All night the drivelling rain dripped like plasma.