?a1425 tr. Guy de Chauliac Grande Chirurgie (N.Y. Acad. Med.) f. 169^v (MED) Of maturatiuez medicinez & of maner of maturing.

1607 B. Jonson Volpone Ep. Ded. sig. ¶4 As I haue car'd to be thankefull for your affections past..let me not dispayre their continuance, to the maturing of some worthier fruits. View more context for this quotation

1625 K. Long tr. J. Barclay Argenis ii. iv. 75 Lycogenes with his Confederates, take no lesse care for the maturing of their enterprise.

1626 F. Bacon Sylua Syluarum §326 The Maturing of Metalls, and therby Turning some of them into Gold.

1753 S. Richardson Hist. Sir Charles Grandison III. vi. 44 There is as much difference in girls, as in fruits, as to their maturing, as I may say.

1854 H. D. Thoreau Walden 154 It was no interruption to conversation to be..watching the rising and maturing of a loaf of bread in the ashes.

1885 Athenæum 25 Apr. 534/3 The gradual maturing of the young hero's mind.

1897 T. C. Allbutt et al. Syst. Med. II. 843 The maturing of wine is the process of development of these ethers.

1926 Psychol. Rev. 33 51 Is this modification of activity the result of..the maturing of certain innate behavior patterns or ‘instincts’?

1965 N. Frye in C. F. Klinck Lit. Hist. Canada 834 The conflict involved is between the poetic impulse to construct and the rhetorical impulse to assert, and the victory of the former is the sign of the maturing of the writer.

1982 Jrnl. Offender Counseling, Services & Rehabilit. 6 65 The study provided additional substantiation of the ‘maturing out’ hypothesis with respect to heroin abuse cited by Winick.

1993 Gourmet Jan. 78/1 Roger Alléose, an affineur (one who specialises in the maturing of cheeses).

1949 J. B. Kenny Compl. Bk. Pottery Making viii. 157 Lower the maturing point of the clay by adding a flux.

1964 H. Hodges Artifacts ii. 47 The temperature at which this takes place is known as the maturing point of the glaze.

1993 Ceramic Industry Jan. 37/3 The further addition of alumina raises the deformation or maturing point.

1931 Jrnl. Amer. Ceramic Soc. 14 102 The firing of the ware could be followed until the proper maturing temperature had been reached.

1934 G. M. Forsyth Art & Craft Potter vii. 73 As the maturing temperature of a glaze increases the proportion of lead compounds must be reduced.

1949 G. de Vegh & A. Mandi Craft of Ceramics (1950) xi. 126 As the maturing temperature of the particular clay is approached, certain minerals or compounds within the clay begin to fuse, melt, and vitrify.

1994 Ceramics Monthly Jan. (Suppl.) 31/3 Some oxides and many stains are refractory and will raise the maturing temperature of a glaze.

?c1425 tr. Guy de Chauliac Grande Chirurgie (Paris) (1971) 590 A medecyne forsoþe suppuratyf or maturynge..maketh hete like to þe hete in þe membre.

1731 R. Gwinnett & E. Thomas Pylades & Corinna 235 Each single Gift They on your Grace bestow, Th'Hereditary-Seeds within you Grow, As each maturing Year will amply show.

1801 R. Southey Thalaba I. iii. 129 His lip was darkened by maturing life.

1820 J. Keats To Autumn i, in Lamia & Other Poems 137 Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun.

1883 T. G. Hake Serpent Play ii. i. 24 They abide their time in the maturing womb, Those spirit forms I saw.

1988 A. Lurie Truth about Lorin Jones i. 10 He needed a maturing experience.

1838 R. Southey Written Immed. after Reading Speech Robert Emmet in Wks. 246 Oh what a lovely manhood had been thine..hadst thou been wisely spared, Left to the slow and certain influences Of silent feeling and maturing thought.

1860 E. C. Jones Percy Vere in Corayda iii. 163 Thus doth the long-maturing fruit Sun-ripened drop, though winds be mute.

1898 E. N. Westcott David Harum xxxix. 329 Beyond the intervening fields, bright with maturing crops, lay the village.

1903 Blackwood's Edinb. Mag. Jan. 44/2 A patch of maturing tobacco.

1907 A. Bierce in Cosmopolitan Dec. 187/1 The primitive character of its domestic architecture no longer suited the maturing tastes of our wealthy citizens.

1922 J. Joyce Ulysses ii. xv. [Circe] 466 Maturing bills of exchange.

1990 Vogue Sept. 127 (advt.) Once a year, Hennessy's maitre de chai..inspects the maturing cognac and the best eaux-de-vie are selected and blended to form Hennessy Cognac.

1994 Sci. Amer. May 94/2 Friedmann..was in his early 30s, a maturing young leader of physics in tumultuous postrevolutionary Red Petrograd.