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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
sett
noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ A full sett of evidence. 1.
▪ But the only sure way to tell if the sett is in use is to watch it.
▪ By then, the four-month-old cubs are well grown and emerge regularly from the sett, often well before dusk.
▪ Even at setts which are used regularly, the signs are not always clear if there are only a few animals present.
▪ Milton was advised that this' will be a means to make most of the Trades fly against the present sett.
▪ Much more tricky than knowing if you've found a badger sett, is knowing whether or not it is still active.
▪ They were caught at the sett after a member of the public spotted them on farmland, said Simon Caterall, prosecuting.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
sett

Set \Set\, n.

  1. The act of setting, as of the sun or other heavenly body; descent; hence, the close; termination. ``Locking at the set of day.''
    --Tennyson.

    The weary sun hath made a golden set.
    --Shak.

  2. That which is set, placed, or fixed. Specifically:

    1. A young plant for growth; as, a set of white thorn.

    2. That which is staked; a wager; a venture; a stake; hence, a game at venture. [Obs. or R.]

      We will in France, by God's grace, play a set Shall strike his father's crown into the hazard.
      --Shak.

      That was but civil war, an equal set.
      --Dryden.

    3. (Mech.) Permanent change of figure in consequence of excessive strain, as from compression, tension, bending, twisting, etc.; as, the set of a spring.

    4. A kind of punch used for bending, indenting, or giving shape to, metal; as, a saw set.

    5. (Pile Driving) A piece placed temporarily upon the head of a pile when the latter cannot be reached by the weight, or hammer, except by means of such an intervening piece. [Often incorrectly written sett.]

    6. (Carp.) A short steel spike used for driving the head of a nail below the surface. Called also nail set.

  3. [Perhaps due to confusion with sect, sept.] A number of things of the same kind, ordinarily used or classed together; a collection of articles which naturally complement each other, and usually go together; an assortment; a suit; as, a set of chairs, of china, of surgical or mathematical instruments, of books, etc. [In this sense, sometimes incorrectly written sett.]

  4. A number of persons associated by custom, office, common opinion, quality, or the like; a division; a group; a clique. ``Others of our set.''
    --Tennyson.

    This falls into different divisions, or sets, of nations connected under particular religions.
    --R. P. Ward.

  5. Direction or course; as, the set of the wind, or of a current.

  6. In dancing, the number of persons necessary to execute a quadrille; also, the series of figures or movements executed.

  7. The deflection of a tooth, or of the teeth, of a saw, which causes the the saw to cut a kerf, or make an opening, wider than the blade.

    1. A young oyster when first attached.

    2. Collectively, the crop of young oysters in any locality.

  8. (Tennis) A series of as many games as may be necessary to enable one side to win six. If at the end of the tenth game the score is a tie, the set is usually called a deuce set, and decided by an application of the rules for playing off deuce in a game. See Deuce.

  9. (Type Founding) That dimension of the body of a type called by printers the width.

  10. (Textiles) Any of various standards of measurement of the fineness of cloth; specif., the number of reeds in one inch and the number of threads in each reed. The exact meaning varies according to the location where it is used. Sometimes written sett.

  11. A stone, commonly of granite, shaped like a short brick and usually somewhat larger than one, used for street paving. Commonly written sett.

  12. Camber of a curved roofing tile.

  13. The manner, state, or quality of setting or fitting; fit; as, the set of a coat. [Colloq.]

  14. Any collection or group of objects considered together. Dead set.

    1. The act of a setter dog when it discovers the game, and remains intently fixed in pointing it out.

    2. A fixed or stationary condition arising from obstacle or hindrance; a deadlock; as, to be at a dead set.

    3. A concerted scheme to defraud by gaming; a determined onset.

      To make a dead set, to make a determined onset, literally or figuratively.

      Syn: Collection; series; group. See Pair.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
sett

see set (n.1).\n\nThe extra t is an arbitrary addition in various technical senses, from a lawn-tennis to a granite set. Each class of persons has doubtless added it to distinguish the special sense that means most to it from all others ; but so many are the special senses that the distinction is now no more distinctive than an Esq. after a man's name, & all would do well to discard it.

[Fowler]

Wiktionary
sett

alt. 1 The system of tunnels that is the home of a badger. 2 The pattern of distinctive threads and yarns that make up the plaid of a Scottish tartan. 3 A small, square-cut piece of quarried stone used for paving and edging. n. 1 The system of tunnels that is the home of a badger. 2 The pattern of distinctive threads and yarns that make up the plaid of a Scottish tartan. 3 A small, square-cut piece of quarried stone used for paving and edging. vb. (obsolete spelling of set English)

WordNet
sett

n. rectangular paving stone with curved top; once used to make roads [syn: cobble, cobblestone]

Wikipedia
Sett

A badger sett or set is a badger's den which usually consists of a network of tunnels and numerous entrances. The largest setts are spacious enough to accommodate 15 or more animals with up to of tunnels and as many as 40 openings. Such elaborate setts with extensive tunneling take many years for badgers to complete. Setts are typically excavated in soil that is well drained and easy to dig, such as sand, and situated on sloping ground where there is some cover.

Sett tunnels are usually between beneath the ground, and they incorporate larger chambers used for sleeping or rearing young. These chambers are lined with dry bedding material such as grass, straw, dead leaves or bracken. Tunnels are wider than they are high, typically around wide by high which matches a badger's wide and stocky build.

The material excavated by the badgers forms large heaps on the slope below the sett. Among this material may be found old bedding material, stones with characteristic heavy scratch-marks, and sometimes even the bones of long-dead badgers cleared out by later generations. Most setts have several active entrances, several more which are used rarely, and some which have fallen into disuse.

Setts are not always excavated entirely in soil; sometimes they are made under the shelter of a shed or in a pile of timber or rocks. They may also be excavated using man-made structures like roofs, building foundations, concrete sidewalks, and paved roadways which can lead to damage of such structures including subsidence.

Badger colonies often utilize several setts: a large main sett usually in the central part of a colony's territory and occupied by most of a colony's members as well as one or more smaller outlier setts. Outlier setts may have only two or three entrances and may be used by a small number of colony members when nearby food sources are in season or in autumn when the main sett is crowded with the year's young.

Badgers typically retreat to their setts at daybreak and come out at dusk. In cold regions, setts are dug below the level at which the ground freezes, and all members of the clan sleep in the same chamber, possibly to share body heat.

Sometimes setts or parts of setts that are not being used by badgers are occupied by rabbits or foxes.

In the United Kingdom, badger setts are protected from disturbance or destruction under the Protection of Badgers Act 1992.

Sett (disambiguation)

A sett is the underground home or den of a family of badgers, usually consisting of a network of tunnels.

Sett or SETT may also refer to:

  • Sett (paving), a shaped piece of rock used to make hard surfaces for roads
  • The Submarine Escape Training Tower at HMS Dolphin, Gosport, UK
  • Sett, the pattern of colored threads or yarns that make of up the distinctive plaid of a Scottish tartan
  • Mining sett, a legal arrangement used to manage the exploitation of land for the extraction of tin
  • Sett, a fictional creature in the animated television series Hellsing
  • Meskwaki Settlement, Iowa, called the "Sett" by residents
  • Sett (surname)
Sett (paving)

A sett, usually referred to in the plural and known in some places as a Belgian block, is a broadly rectangular quarried stone used for paving roads. Formerly in widespread use, particularly on steeper streets because setts provided horses' hooves with better grip than a smooth surface, they are now encountered rather as decorative stone paving in landscape architecture. Setts are often inaccurately referred to as "cobbles": a sett is distinct from a cobblestone in that it is quarried or worked to a regular shape, whereas the latter is generally a small, naturally-rounded rock.

Setts are usually made of granite.

Sett (surname)

Sett (pronounced "Sheth") is a Bengali surname, derived from "Shreshthi" (which means businessman in Hindi). Shreshthis were the oldest known businessmen in northern India. The name was changed to "Shethi" during the medieval period. After the arrival of the East India Company in India, the surname was anglicised to "Sheth" and later to "Sett".

The Setts originally came from Gujarat during the 15th century and settled in Saptagram, Bengal and were engaged in primarily trading in cotton. In those days Saptagram was a prosperous trading port in the East Indies and it was the Portuguese who were the predominant European merchants there. They used to call it "Porto Pequeno" or Little Haven and predated the British by more than 100 years. The Setts prospered and gradually started to blend into the Bengali culture. Gradual silting caused Saptagram to lose its importance and the Setts moved their business further down to Betor, which was in Howrah, diagonally opposite Calcutta across the Ganges. While in Betor they set up their residences in Gobindapur (present day Dalhousie Square in Calcutta. Those days Gobindapur was a dense marshy jungle inhabited by wild animals. The Setts cleared the area and build their mansions over here. With the advent of the British, Dutch and other European traders, Betor was poised to be a major trading centre and the Setts became the dominating Indian merchants of the region. Job Charnock arrived from Patna towards the end of the 17th century and established a trading post.

When the British decided to build a fort in Calcutta to protect their mercantile interest, they asked the inhabitants of Gobindapur to move further north into Sutanuti. The Setts moved to Banstolla, present day Hariram Goenka Street, Burrabazar and resettled their family deity, 'Gobinda Jew" and built their dwellings around that. The Sett family temple and mansions are still there and stands testimony to the wealth and prosperity of the Setts.

From different sources one gets the general idea that a major part of Dalhousie Square belonged to the Setts. Calcutta is because of their endeavours and they are the lost founders of the city that went on to become the capital of British India and made its place in history.

Usage examples of "sett".

Huy marched the Sixth Ben-Amon to the garrison fort on the banks of the great river at Sett, and here he put the legion into camp in a forest of mopane trees which would screen them from observers on the opposite bank.

The mew with its granite setts takes them away from the tower blocks and maisonettes to a world of gentrified Victorian cottages converted from stables, and flat-roofed, architect-designed houses in wood and yellow brick, with living room windows on the first floor extending the width of the frontage.

Duke-Colonel Jundrak of Sann, Subcolonel Heen Sett, half a dozen or so junior officers.

Garages and workshops occupy the arches of the viaduct, their doors opening onto shabby forecourts of granite setts slippery with oil.

The mew with its granite setts takes them away from the tower blocks and maisonettes to a world of gentrified Victorian cottages converted from stables, and flat-roofed, architect-designed houses in wood and yellow brick, with living room windows on the first floor extending the width of the frontage.

They made an abrupt left turn on to granite setts, the car wheels rumbling as Murray swung it round the next corner.

England, stowed in quarters in ye ship they now gott her out and sett their carpenters to worke to trime her up: but being much brused and shatered in ye ship with foule weather, they saw she sould be longe in mending.

Towse, his wife, since his death tolde me that her husband and she living at Windsor Castle, where he had an office that Sumer that ye Duke of Buckingham was killed, tolde her that very day that the Duke was sett upon by ye mutinous Mariners att Portesmouth, saying then that ye next attempt agaynst him would be his Death, which accordingly happened.

On the granite setts outside was spread the junk-the chipped green and cream enamel saucepans, the rusting kitchen tools and the unwashed clothing.

The science of biochemistry learned more in the next ten years than it had in the past seventy centuries, and the Oligarchy had sold the public on a pipedream: we were going to create a race of supermen that would blast the Setts to kingdom come.

There were the cobblestones: catheads, trollheads, loaves, short and long setts, rounders, Morpork Sixes, and the eighty-seven types of paving brick, and the fourteen types of stone slab, and the twelve types of stone never intended for street slabs which had got used anyway, and had their own patterns of wear, and the rubbles and the gravels, and the repairs, and the thirteen different types of cellar cover and twenty types of drain lid He bounced a little, like a man testing the hardness of something.

If I doe such things as I canot give reasons for, it is like you have sett a foole aboute your bussines, and so turne ye reproofe to your selves, & send an other, and let me come againe to my Combes.

No severed hands were found hidden down a badger sett or a fox hole.

D'yu mean to sett there where y'are now, coddlin your supernumerary leg, wi'that bizar tongue in yur tolkshap, and your hindies and shindies, like a muck in a market, Sorley boy, repeating yurself, and tell me that?

There were the cobblestones: catheads, trollheads, loaves, short and long setts, rounders, Morpork Sixes, and the eighty-seven types of paving brick, and the fourteen types of stone slab, and the twelve types of stone never intended for street slabs which had got used anyway, and had their own patterns of wear, and the rubbles and the gravels, and the repairs, and the thirteen different types of cellar cover and twenty types of drain lid—.