| 释义 |
† beˈstraught, v. and ppl. a. Obs.
Also 6 bestrought.
[f. be- intensive + straught (found as early as 1520); cf. also astraught, distraught. The genesis of these forms seems to have been thus: L. distractus gave distract, and (on some Eng. analogies) distraught; thence astraught and straught; hence be-straught and (with reference again to distract) be-stract; finally bestraughted. Found as pa. pple. and also as pa. tense of a vb., of which the present ought analogically to have been bestract. But this is app. not found; and the later inflexions bestraughted, -ing, imply that bestraught was itself assumed as the present.]
1. as pa. tense of a vb. Distracted, bereft (of wits).
1580North Plutarch (1676) 278 An Oracle..whose spirit possessed many Inhabitants thereabouts, and bestraught them of their wits.
2. pa. pple. and adj. Distracted, distraught.
a1547Surrey æneid iv. 360 æneas with that vision striken down Well nere bestraught. 1586Warner Alb. Eng. i. ii, 'Till she, as one bestrought Did crie. 1603Holland Plutarch's Mor. 459 His wits were bestraught. 1642T. Taylor God's Judgem. i. i. vii. 14 Like a man bestraught he ranne after them. 1748Richardson Clarissa (1811) VIII. 248, I have been, to use an old word, quite bestraught. |