?1662 D. S. To All Clothiers of Eng. 5 A perticular inspection..to see they do nothing..to the setting of the Market, raising or lowering of the Commodities.

1669 S. Sturmy Mariners Mag. i. 16 Such indifferent things as..hoising, looring, and the like.

1753 Chambers's Cycl. Suppl. Lowering,..the debasing of the strength of any spirituous liquor by mixing water with it.

1796 E. Burke Thoughts Prospect Regicide Peace 55 The lowering or the hoisting of a sail.

1868 W. Lockyer & J. N. Lockyer tr. A. Guillemin Heavens (ed. 3) 193 The lowering of the temperature in February and May.

1890 ‘R. Boldrewood’ Colonial Reformer (1891) 171 A continuous course of baiting, lowering and hauling up.

1917 Munsey's Mag. Nov. 265/1 There was stage business, too—slight gestures of the head and hand, raisings and lowerings of the eyebrows.

1968 J. Winearls Mod. Dance (ed. 2) ii. 38 Raising and lowering can follow each other in uninterrupted snake-like ripples.

1998 N. Lawson How to Eat (1999) p. viii The gastronomic apathy and consequent lowering of standards nationally.

1789 Mem. Med. Soc. London 2 45 The lowering effects of tea-drinking [in place of more nutritious food], lead too many of these to seek for relief from spirits.

1811 W. Huntington Let. 11 Dec. in Posthumous Lett. (1815) III. 206 I have got a cold and a cough, and a lowering fever.

1833 B. Disraeli Wondrous Tale Alroy I. v. vi. 190 All is to be. It is a lowering thought.

1858 ‘G. Eliot’ Janet's Repentance ii, in Scenes Clerical Life II. 75 Mrs. Phipps had no patience with Mrs. Lowme,..looking as yellow as any crow-flower, and yet letting Pilgrim bleed and blister her and give her lowering medicine till her clothes hung on her like a scarecrow's.

1882 C. D. F. Phillips Materia Medica & Therapeutics: Inorg. Substances 208 An excessive use of the waters is very lowering.

1921 Devel. European Nations 1870–1921 (ed. 6) ix. 317 A course of study in the Blue Books dealing with Chinese affairs in 1897-99 may with some confidence be prescribed as a sedative and lowering diet.

1936 ‘J. Tey’ Shilling for Candles xvi. 184 Her lady always had acute depression after a letter had come... She had said once: ‘Hate is very lowering, isn't it, Bundle?’

1989 M. Chesney Finessing Clarissa (1991) i. 8 It was very lowering to the spirits..to have a mother who was always so sadly disappointed.

2011 K. V. Wasylowski Darcy & Fitzwilliam 260 It was very lowering, Anthony. She made me feel very sad.

1817 Philos. Mag. 50 242 Pigments, being imperfect in hue, have a neutralizing or lowering effect upon each other.

1895 Daily News 3 June 7/2 The felt branches continue dull, at lowering prices.

1899 E. Griffith-Jones Ascent through Christ i. iii. 120 There are lowering influences in the environment.

1949 Life 3 Oct. 109/1 In the lowering altitude some of the yaks began bleeding at the nose.

2011 D. Hohn Moby Duck (2012) iv. 170 Ernst threw himself up onto the boom and smothered the lowering sail.

1899 Boston Med. & Surg. Jrnl. 1 June 523/1 Extracts of the sympathetic have a marked blood-pressure-lowering effect.

1937 Hartford (Connecticut) Courant 18 Feb. 10/7 Antipyretic (fever-lowering).

1948 H. Greengard in G. Pincus & K. V. Thimann Hormones I. vi. 244 Other workers have apparently extracted a blood-sugar-lowering substance from the salivary glands.

1975 Texas Monthly Aug. 6/2 I am absolutely livid with rage at the thought of Tim Timmons..spreading that consciousness-lowering fundamentalist merde.

1996 D. Lim Explaining Econ. Growth v. 125 For such firms cost-lowering incentives will be more attractive.

2012 Daily Tel. 20 Oct. 16/1 Cholesterol-lowering drugs are often prescribed to..older people who are deemed to be at high risk of suffering a..stroke.