prime movern.

1633 W. Prynne Histrio-mastix 836 The Play-poet being the prime mover in this infernal sphere of lewdnesse.

1674 in O. Airy Essex Papers (1890) I. 191 Four or five men..have made it their whole business..to incite the Citizens to these disturbances..,which prime movers are men of small Estates.

1739 D. Hume Treat. Human Nature I. iii. 280 'Tis the deity..who is the prime mover of the universe.

1847 M. B. Betham-Edwards Jrnl. 1 Jan. in A. R. Johnston et al. Marching with Army of West (1936) 241 Colonel Price, who issued orders for the apprehension of the priest, Tomas Ortiz, and some few others who were the prime movers of it [sc. the gathering].

1867 E. A. Freeman Hist. Norman Conquest I. iv. 223 The prime mover in the whole matter was Hugh the Great.

1874 W. Humphrey in Ess. Relig. & Lit. 3rd Ser. 361 The unmoved and unmovable Prime Mover of the ever-moving universe of creatures.

1939 R. G. Collingwood Autobiogr. xii. 158 In Socialism, the prime mover was the desire for the whole nation's social and economic welfare.

1972 Science 26 May 892/3 Jamie L. Whitten,..a prime mover in the passage 18 years ago of Public Law 566.

2005 Commercial Appeal (Memphis, Tennesse) (Nexis) 20 Mar. v8 The fossil records are overwhelming, and that is the basis of scientific support for evolution, but that certainly does not rule out the role of God as the prime mover.

1795 Philos. Trans. (Royal Soc.) 85 189 This experiment confirms those made by Mr Hunter, in which he recovered the animals by inflating the lungs... It shews that respiration is the prime mover of the machine.

1809 Edinb. Rev. 15 146 Suppose a delicate magnetic bar were made the prime-mover of a watch.

1869 Eng. Mech. 31 Dec. 378/1 Until recently (and even now for convenience) such machines as windmills, water-wheels, and steam-engines, were called ‘prime movers’.

1870 J. Yeats Nat. Hist. Commerce 30 Previous to the employment of steam as a motive force, water was the prime mover.

1938 A. E. Clayton Performance & Design Direct Current Machines (ed. 2) i. 12 The machine acts as a generator of electrical energy, and converts mechanical energy supplied by the prime mover into electrical energy.

1971 Sci. Amer. Sept. 37/3 By the 16th century the waterwheel was by far the most important prime mover.

1987 E. H. J. Pallett Aircraft Electr. Syst. (ed. 3) x. 157/1 Several types of turbine-powered aircraft are equipped with starter systems which utilize a prime mover having the dual function of engine starting and of supplying power to the aircraft's electrical system.

1860 Lancet 4 Aug. 121/1 The inspiratory muscles, acting on the mechanically constituted thorax, declare themselves to be the prime movers of inspiration.

1918 F. Treves Surg. Appl. Anat. (ed. 7) xv. 328 A muscle may act as (1) a prime mover, (2) an antagonist, (3) a synergic muscle, (4) a fixation muscle.

1960 R. D. Lockhart in G. H. Bourne Struct. & Function Muscle I. i. 13 The antagonists must relax to allow the prime movers to operate.

2004 Guardian 3 Apr. (Weekend Suppl.) 55/1 If you are lying on your back on a bench lifting a couple of dumbbells, the prime mover is the chest (pectoral) and the synergist is the back of the upper arms (triceps).

1938 T. J. Hayes Elem. Ordnance xix. 677 Artillery prime movers are used to tow artillery.

1963 Dict. U.S. Mil. Terms (U.S. Dept. Defense) 171 Prime mover, a vehicle, including heavy construction equipment, possessing military characteristics, designed primarily for towing heavy, wheeled weapons and frequently providing facilities for the transportation of the crew of, and ammunition for, the weapon.

1969 Age (Melbourne) 24 May 61/9 (advt.) Commer semi trailer outfit complete, 61 mod., petrol motor, prime mover and 34 ft. semi trailer... $2000.

2005 What Papers Say (Russia) (Nexis) 11 May 29 The plant took into consideration the Chechen experience and created the Vyztrel vehicle for escorting convoys and a heavy prime mover for towing semi-trailers with armored combat vehicles.