Almost certainly,
thrist means
thirst.
Recall that the spelling of English words was fluid up until printed texts
became widespread: Spelling followed pronunciation.
At some point, probably Dr.
Samuel Johnson's
1755 dictionary, spelling became fixed.
I am informed
1 that the above is not correct: Apparently some vowel+
r constructs in
Old English were pronounced either way, in a phemonenon called "
metathesis": We see the final uses of a form that did not survive.
There is an online search engine
2 for
the Faerie Queene!
Thus, I was able to look for
Edmund Spenser's use of "thrist".
So, Book 1, Canto 6, Stanza 38 contains:
Then gan the Pilgrim thus, I chaunst this day,
This fatall day, that shall I euer rew,
To see two knights in trauell on my way
(A sory sight) arraung'd in battell new,
Both breathing vengeaunce, both of wrathfull hew:
My fearefull flesh did tremble at their strife,
To see their blades so greedily imbrew,
That drunke with bloud, yet thristed after life:
What more? the Redcrosse knight was slaine with Paynim knife.
And then , Book 1, Canto 10, Stanza 38:
The second was as Almner of the place,
His office was, the hungry for to feed,
And thristy giue to drinke, a worke of grace:
He feard not once him selfe to be in need,
Ne car'd to hoord for those, whom he did breede:
The grace of God he layd vp still in store,
Which as a stocke he left vnto his seede;
He had enough, what need him care for more?
And had he lesse, yet some he would giue to the pore.
I found another use of the word "thrist" that isn't certainly a misspelling of "thirst", in the transliteration of a scanned
3 Renaissance book printed in the 15th century by the firm of
Chepman and Myllar.
This book contains a poem
The Testament of Mr Andro Kennedy,
by
Scots poet
William Dunbar, who lived from c.
1460 to c.
1520.
Dunbar writes in
Scots dialect, and there are a few places where "thrist" appears:
He sall ascend as ane horrebble grephoun, Him meit sall in the air ane scho dragoun; Thir terrible monsteris sall togidder thrist.
and
Scho wes like a caldrone cruke cler vnder kellys thai threpit that scho deit of thrist et maid a gud end.
1Thank you, O Gritchka.
2http://virtual.park.uga.edu/~mkozusko/spenser/fqsearch.html
3a project of the British National Library Service at
http://www.nls.uk/digitallibrary/chepman/index.htm.