beatermost

beatermost adj Pronc spp beatemest, beatemost, beatomest, beatumest [Prob folk-etym for (or by analogy with) bettermost adj on the basis of beat surpass] NEast obs

= beatenest adj.

1827 Amer. Traveller (Boston MA) 30 Mar [2]/5, Of all murderous attempts to assassinate our old friend Murray, this is absolutely, in the phrase of the old woman, the beatermost. 1831 Daily Eve. Transcript (Boston MA) 9 Aug 2/3, He . . sees old Susap . . stan’ there with his gun pyntin’ right into the door—beatemest feller with a gun ever you seed. 1837 (1838) Sargent Temperance Tales 4.160 NEng, I should miss cider though, dreadfully. But I’ll tell ye what it is, it’s the beatemost stuff that ever was, to make a body feel crusty. 1844 Rover 3.65 neMA, It was a noble fish, a full “twenty pounder,” and in the language of Mrs. B., . . “it was the beatumest fish you ever saw.” 1845 Kirkland Western Clearings 98, The Maineman . . will declare [his cow] to be the “beatermost critter under the canopy.” 1851 Judd Margaret 2.62 ME, The Parson [=a cow] . . is the worst pair of horns I ever druv, and I have had the business now rising of sixty year, and take it by and large fifty head a season, and she is the beatomest. [DARE Ed: In the first ed (1845, p. 283) “beater of all” stands in place of “beatomest.”] 1876 Harper’s New Mth. Mag. 52.722 NEng, You are the beatermost woman for finding a mare’s-nest that ever I come across. 1884 St. Nicholas 12.6 NY, You ’re as willin’ a youngster as ever I saw; but the beatermost dunderpate in all creation. 1899 Brown Tiverton Tales 216 NEng, You ’re the beatemest for tolin’ anybody on. I never knew I had so much to say. 1922 Dix Turned-About 27 [Black], The porter . . was put to silence. He pocketed the money that she gave him, chuckled, muttered that she was “de beatermost,” and went his way.