noun an armpit, the under arm: She put her wee bairn in her oxter... 15-.
verb to lead or support by the underarm: So the old woman oxtered him up to the house and made him take off his wet clothes and she put a blanket round him... la19-. etymology: Scots; apparently a variant (perhaps after an early Scandinavian cognate) of an unattested Middle English reflex of Old English ōxta, ōhsta (earlier ōcusta) from a suffixed form of the Germanic base of Old Saxon ōhasa, Old High German uohasa, uohhisa, Middle High German uohse, üehse; the –r of the final syllable is difficult to explain; perhaps compare Norwegian regional oster ‘the throat, the hollow above the collarbone’ alongside Old Icelandic óstr, Icelandic hóstur; also hóst, óst, Faroese óstur, all in the same sense.; also attested in Shelta; attested by SR, BS in TDITA, JS,ET, BW; DW and Sandy Stewart in RL