Definition of "ate"

I have a very good appetite, have ate some excellent melons, and they have served me up some quails, the fattest and tenderest I have ever ate.

1805, Maximilien de Béthune duc de Sully, Memoirs of Maximillian de Bethune, Duke of Sully, Prime Minister of Henry the Great […] ‎, volume IV, page 171

As soon as all had ate, and the elder ones paid, the carriage was ordered; […]

1813 January 27, [Jane Austen], chapter XVI, in Pride and Prejudice: […], volume II, London: […] [George Sidney] for T[homas] Egerton, […], page 192

“Haven't ate all the eggs, I hope? For I be hungry as a hunter […]

1929, Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch, Nicky-Nan, Reservist‎, page 27

So I'd have ate when me Dad had ate, sort of thing, I think, you know when he come home from work, I'd have waited for him, I wouldn't have said I wanted mine at four o'clock […]

2013 January 11 , David Bell, Gill Valentine, Consuming Geographies: We Are Where We Eat‎, Routledge, page 140