darg

First attested in late Middle English; a syncopic form of daywork, developed through the series of forms: daywork → daywerk → daywark → dawark → *da’ark → dark → darg.

• dawerk, dawark [15th century]
• daurk [18th century]
• daark, dark, darrak, darroch, dargue, daurg [19th century]

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: därg, IPA^(key): /dɑːɡ/
• Rhymes: -ɑːɡ

darg (plural dargs)

1. (in Scotland and northern English dialects) A day's work.
2. (in Scotland and northern English dialects) A defined quantity or amount of work, or of the product of work, done in a certain time or at a certain rate of payment; a task.

• “Darg” listed on page 33 of volume III (D–E), § i (D) of A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles [1st ed., 1897]
• “darg” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary [2nd ed., 1989]

The ŏ of dog (dŏg) has merged with ä in many American dialects.

darg (plural dargs)

1. (dialect) Informal form of dog.
   • 1897, Herbert George Wells, chapter III, in The Invisible Man‎:

     Hall had stood gaping. "He wuz bit," said Hall. "I’d better go and see to en," and he trotted after the stranger. He met Mrs. Hall in the passage. "Carrier’s darg," he said "bit en."

• Gard, Grad, drag, gard, grad

Alteration of dark, a contraction of dawark, daywerk ‘day's work’.

darg (plural dargs)

1. a day's work (especially agricultural labour)
2. an amount or number of something produced in a day