1850 Notes & Queries 1st Ser. I. 352/2 I have often heard military men talk of swot, meaning thereby mathematics; and persons eminent in that science are termed ‘good swots’.

1899 S. R. Crockett Kit Kennedy 307 Mary is a good girl, but I own it is no end of a swot to have to see her home from night~school.

1905 H. A. Vachell Hill iii. 51 Our object is..to get through the ‘swat’ with as little squandering of valuable time as possible.

1866 Routledge's Every Boy's Ann. 220 ‘Oh, you swat!’ met us at every turn.. and yet the real truth was, that neither Jack nor myself did ‘swat’.

1899 ‘Martello Tower’ At School & at Sea 40 Sometimes a knot of us..would persuade a good-natured swot to construe the forthcoming lesson to us.

1860 J. C. Hotten Dict. Slang (ed. 2) Swot,..to work hard for an examination, to be diligent in one's studies.—Army.

1866 Routledge's Every Boy's Ann. 220 ‘Oh, you swat!’ met us at every turn.. and yet the real truth was, that neither Jack nor myself did ‘swat’.

1899 E. Phillpotts Human Boy 120 He was swatting like anything in play-hours for a special Old Testament history prize.

1901 Chambers's Jrnl. July 445/2 Dick was ‘swotting’ blue china for all he was worth, at the British Museum and elsewhere.

1908 Athenæum 25 July 93/2 It is the case that boys deliberately set themselves to ‘slack’ or ‘swot’ for longer or shorter periods.

1913 Wireless World 1 37/2 There will be a chance for fellows like me, who have been swatting up Fleming's books.

1931 R. Campbell Georgiad i. 18 All who..of despair have baulked the yawning precipice By swotting up his melancholy recipes For ‘happiness’.

1955 Times 26 May 13/2 Mr. Forester must have ‘swotted up’ the subject of wartime Atlantic convoys just as he ‘swotted up’ the subject of the Navy in Nelson's time.

1967 K. Giles Death in Diamonds vi. 114 Been swatting the maps, I see.

1977 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 23 June 8/2 Our culture hound..swots up in the Encyclopedia before distinguished guests arrive.