| 释义 |
starkness|ˈstɑːknɪs|
[f. stark a. + -ness.]
1. Rigidity, stiffness (of the body or limbs).
c1440Promp. Parv. 472/2 Starkenesse (or styfnesse) rigor, rigiditas, artitudo. 1544T. Phaer Regim. Life (1560) R vj b, Of the stifnes or starckenes of limmes. 1627[R. Bernard] Guide to Grand Jury Men i. ii. 17 With a generall starknesse and stiffenesse. 1846Trench Mirac. xxvii. (1862) 368 note, The stiffness and starkness, the unnatural rigescence of the limbs in the accesses of the disorder. a1893C. Rossetti Verses 135 Night for the dead in their stiffness and starkness!
†2. ? ‘Stark’ or utter privation. Obs.
1544Betham Precepts War i. lxxvii. E j b, His souldiours..were wyllynge to fyght, fastyng and undyned: wherby the mooste parte of them clunged for colde, was rather by starknesse of meat, than by y⊇ violence of theyr enemies slayne. 1616J. Lane Contn. Sqr.'s T. vi. 86 So tooke hee order how his campe and shipps shoold bee revictualld, ear them starcnes nipps.
3. Sternness, harshness. arch. (See stark a. 2 b.)
1884M. Creighton Hist. Ess. viii. (1902) 248 He [William I] let men feel his starkness by his remorseless harrying of the north.
4. Absoluteness, utterness.
1641Milton Animadv. Wks. 1851 III. 220 How should wee have yeelded to his heavenly call, had we beene taken, as they were, in the starknes of our ignorance. 1849H. Rogers Ess. (1860) III. 252 Those legislative pedants..who would propose to give New Zealanders and Hottentots in the starkness of their savage ignorance, the complex forms of the British Constitution.
5. Bareness, nakedness.
a1849J. C. Mangan Poems (1859) 415 The rocks with their steepness, And the earth with its starkness. 1896Mrs. Caffyn Quaker Grandmother 101 It would go hard with her before that thought, with anything of the starkness of fact about it, could so much as enter into her mind. |