1575 G. Gascoigne Noble Arte Venerie lxvi. 186 In grounde that is harde to dygge, as in galte, clay, and stonye grounde.

1698 J. Fryer New Acct. E.-India & Persia 332 The Element..vegetates, and takes upon it the Nature of Minerals, Stones, Gaults, or Clay.

1767 Philos. Trans. 1766 (Royal Soc.) 56 12 This stratum of gravel is..surrounded with a bed of very dark blue golt.

1808 C. Vancouver Gen. View Agric. Devon xi. 285 The bottom of this drain was formed of a retentive clay or gault.

1832 J. Baxter Libr. Agric. & Hort. Knowl. (ed. 2) 280 Chalk marl and galt are the strata which appear immediately under the lower chalk formation, and occupy a valley at the foot of the chalk hills.

1833 C. Lyell Princ. Geol. III. Gloss. 69 Gault, a provincial name in the east of England for a series of beds of clay and marl, the geological position of which is between the upper and the lower greensand.

1876 D. Page Adv. Text-bk. Geol. (ed. 6) xviii. 337 The argillaceous strata..known by the provincial term ‘gault’ or ‘golt’.

1889 Athenæum No. 3244. 883/1 Urchins who, like horses in a gault-mill, trotted beneath the structure in a circle and pushed it round.

1851 H. Stephens Bk. of Farm (ed. 2) §2124 The process of gaulting or claying the soil.

1893 S. Baring-Gould Cheap Jack Zita II. xvi. 48 How should I be paid for my gaulting? and without gaulting there can be no banking.

?1881 Census Eng. & Wales: Instr. Clerks classifying Occupations & Ages (?1885) 86 Clay Banksman, Clay Miner..Gaulter.

1893 S. Baring-Gould Cheap Jack Zita II. xvi. 39 Gangers, clayers, bankers, gaulters.