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haphazard, n., a. and adv.|ˈhæpˌhæzəd|
[f. hap n.1 + hazard: lit. ‘hazard of chance’.]
A. n.
a. Mere chance or accident; fortuity. Chiefly in phr. at haphazard, by († in) haphazard, by mere chance, without design; at random, casually.
1575R. B. Appius & Virginia in Hazl. Dodsley IV. 106 [One of the dramatis personæ] Haphazard. 1576Fleming Panopl. Epist. 227 It is hap hazard, if you escape undamnified. Ibid. 237 Happe hasarde it is, if you be not prest out for a souldier. 1577Hanmer Anc. Eccl. Hist. (1619) 339 The interchangeable course of these calamities, commeth not to pass by hap hazard. 1642Rogers Naaman 21 One that goes not to worke at a meere hap-hazard. 1726Leoni Designs Pref. 1/1 Ornaments thrown together at hap-hazard. 1862Beveridge Hist. India II. v. viii. 479 Everything was left to a kind of hap-hazard. 1889Spectator 23 Nov., The..hereditary principle, with all its necessary haphazard.
†b. A matter of chance. Obs.
1594Carew Huarte's Exam. Wits (1616) 268 If the generation take not effect at the first comming, it is a great hap hazard, but that at the second a female shalbe begotten. a1680Charnock Attrib. God (1834) I. 557 How many events..seem to persons ignorant of these counsels to be a hap-hazard.
B. adj. Characterized by haphazard; dependent upon chance or accident; random.
1671Maynwaring Anc. & Mod. Phys. 101 This is not a time to practice with hap hazard medicines. 1805Southey Lett. (1856) I. 346 But his praise and his censure are alike haphazard and worthless. 1872Black Adv. Phaeton xxvii. 365 Some haphazard remark. 1875J. C. Cox Ch. Derbysh. I. 208 Fragments of coloured glass..inserted in a haphazard fashion.
C. adv. In a haphazard manner; at haphazard; at random; casually.
1857Dickens Lett. (1880) II. 30 We came here haphazard, but could not have done better. 1873H. Spencer Stud. Sociol. xv. 383 Knowledge of human nature gained hap⁓hazard. 1883F. Harrison Choice Bks. (1886) 395 This new social system did not come hap-hazard.
Hence † hapˈhazarder (obs. nonce-wd.), ? one who ventures at haphazard. hapˈhazarding, haphazard action. hapˈhazardly adv., in a haphazard manner, at haphazard. hapˈhazardness, haphazard quality or character; also hapˈhazardry.
1573G. Harvey Letter-bk. (Camden) 142 Who but happ hazarder in Madame fortunes lapp? a1819J. Watt in Athenæum 6 Sept. (1890) 311/2 [He fell upon most of his best things by a kind of chance, or, as James Watt put it, by] ‘random haphazarding’. 1867Athenæum 14 Sept. 336 [κυβεία] in Ephes. iv. 14..is translated sleight: the proper rendering seems to be recklessness, haphazardness. 1874Burnand My time xxv. 232 This haphazarding sort of profession. 1887Chamb. Jrnl. 26 Nov. 754 Seating them quite haphazardly. 1932V. Woolf Common Reader 2nd Ser. 63 But with all this haphazardry, the Letters..provide their own continuity. 1949Scrutiny Sept. 196 Antony and Cleopatra has none of the haphazardries of Pericles. 1959Times Lit. Suppl. 7 Aug. 459/1 A tape-recorder..that can reproduce in all their haphazardry the jumbled rhythms of modern conversation. |