equicide

Noun

equicide (countable and uncountable, plural equicides)

1. The killing of a horse.
   • Before him lay extended the brown body of a donkey, whose broken lariot and fixed eye told the tale. I thought for a moment that its hoof was moving; but before a word had passed, all was still.[…] / “Messieurs, it was not my fault. I told them at Weggis the animal was too small; but they forced...1852 July, R. M. Richardson, “Men, Manners, and Mountains. Mounting the Righi, in Three Heats.”, in Sartain’s Magazine, volume XI, number 1, page 23, column 1
   • The idea of making beef out of that noble animal, for which every man of heart entertains an affection only second to that which binds him to his own race—the animal which approaches nearer than any other of the four-footed creation to man, in the nobler traits of soul and character—could only...1857 August 8, Memphis Daily Appeal, Memphis, Tenn., page 2
2. One who or that which kills a horse.
   • Fathers of families with corpulent wives and a numerous progeny, never heed the torture they impose upon the unhappy animal but they one and all crowd into the feeaton with a turn over seat and drive away with their families to Clapton, Hackney, Turnham Green or Bow—in short wherever their country...1840 June, Dragsman, “Another Chapter on Driving”, in The Sportsman (Second Series), volume II, number VI, London: […] the Office, […], page 407
   • About seventy equicides assembled at the fixture specified in the card of “The Meets,” that is to say, The Black Bull, on a foggy, splashy, mnddy,^([sic – meaning muddy]) fishing, Scotch misty, egg flip-drinking day.1853 March 7, The Freeman’s Journal, Dublin, page 3