kenning
Sight, view; specifically a distant view at sea.
obsolete
Touching the moſt remarkeable things of the Country and our proceeding from the 17 of Auguſt 1585. till the 18. of Iune 1586. we made Roanoack our habitation. The vtmoſt of our diſcouery Southward was Secotan as we eſteemed 80. leagues from Roanoacke. The paſſage from thence was thought a broad ſound within the maine, being without kenning of land, yet full of flats and ſhoulds that our Pinnaſſe could not paſſe, […]
The range or extent of vision, especially at sea; (by extension) a marine measure of approximately twenty miles.
obsolete
Scylley is a Kenning, that is to ſay about an xx. Miles from the very Weſteſte Point of Cornewaulle.
As little as one can discriminate or recognize; a small portion, a little.
His father was none so ill a man, though a kenning on the wrong side of the law, and no friend to my family, that I should waste my breath to be defending him!
Where it comes from
From Middle English kenning, kening (“instruction, teaching; experience, knowledge; sight, view”), from kennen (“to make known, point out, reveal; to direct, instruct, teach; to know, perceive”) + -ing. Kennen is derived from Old English cennan (“to make known, declare”), from Proto-West Germanic *kannijan, from Proto-Germanic *kannijaną (“to make known”), the causative form of *kunnaną (“to know, be familiar with, recognize; to be able to, know how”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵneh₃- (“to know”). Compare Danish kending (“acquaintance”), and see further at ken. By surface analysis, ken + -ing.
Adapted from the Wiktionary entry kenning (CC BY-SA 4.0).