rakehelladj.n.

a1547 Earl of Surrey Poems (1964) 24 The rakhell life that longes to loves disporte.

1589 J. Lyly Pappe with Hatchet B ij If Martin haue not barrelde vp all rakehell words.

1901 M. J.Cawain Poems (1908) III. 361 Rusty-spurred he stands In rakehell boots and belt.

1991 Paris Rev. Fall 133 A couple of days after..the first in an exhausting succession of faculty parties uncompromising in their voluptuary and rakehell excess, I sat in the study.

1556 J. Olde tr. R. Gwalther Antichrist f. 186 Most filthie rakehell masse priestes.

1596 E. Spenser Second Pt. Faerie Queene v. xi. sig. X8 Amid their rakehell bands, They spide a Lady. View more context for this quotation

1614 J. Taylor Nipping of Abuses sig. C4^v Next summond was, a rakehell furgound curre, Cal'd Auarice.

1682 E. Pearse Conformist's 2nd Plea for Nonconformists 28 A reviling sort of Rake-hell Scriblers.

1782 W. Cowper Progress of Error in Poems 314 Some lewd earl, or rakehell baronet.

1896 S. R. Crockett Cleg Kelly xvi [A] rake-hell cat skirmishing across from area-railing to area-railing.

1915 J. G. Neihardt Coll. Poems (1926) 350 There was a rakehell lad, called little Jim... Blue-eyed was he and femininely fair.

1976 Forbes 15 May 64 Jennie told the romantic story of an American heiress and a rakehell British politician destined by history to become the parents of Winston Churchill.

1993 Time 1 Nov. 85/1 Gaylord Ravenal, the rakehell gambler who wins, and breaks, her heart.

1560 J. Daus tr. J. Sleidane Commentaries f. xvij^v Rome..is the most filthy sinke of al the places in the Vniuersall worlde, and a rakehell heaped of all mischief [L. inexhausta colluvies].

c1560 J. Awdely Cruel Assault Gods Fort (single sheet) These were the rakehels that did seke, To haue mens goodes playde Cains dede.

1561 J. Bale Declar. Pref. sig. Ai^v After the mischeuous example of Cain and the other rake hels.

1581 J. Bell tr. W. Haddon & J. Foxe Against Jerome Osorius 315 Momish Monckes, flatteryng Fryers, and others such lyke Religious Rackhells.

1603 H. Crosse Vertues Common-wealth sig. M2 Al the rake-hels & loose vagabounds in a countrey.

1649 Man in Moon 6–13 Dec. 265 Some few desperate Rakehells.

1690 J. Mackenzie Siege London-derry 2/1 These Rake-hells (who were the very scum of the Countrey).

1766 C. Anstey New Bath Guide xiv. ii. 97 Brother Simkin's grown a Rakehell, Cards and dances ev'ry Day.

a1854 R. M. Bird News of Night ii. iii, in America's Lost Plays (1941) xii. 157 Well, young fellow, you are a rakehell, I see.

1870 W. Thornbury Tour Eng. I. ii. 43 The wild son of a baronet, a rake-hell who had been brought up at Eton.

1963 K. Vonnegut Cat's Cradle (1965) 69 When the war ended, the young rakehell of the Rumfoord family, Remington Rumfoord, IV, proposed to sail his steam yacht, the Scheherazade, around the world.

1993 Washington Post 28 Nov. 9/2 In ‘Don Giovanni’ the legendary rakehell now reduced to playing the piano in a midwestern honky-tonk, lectures Figaro about Love and Marriage.