?a1425 tr. Guy de Chauliac Grande Chirurgie (N.Y. Acad. Med.) f. 9^v In ramifying [L. ramificando] it [sc. the vein or artery] is deduced to þe extremitez of þe body..for to quiken alle þe membrez.

1682 N. Grew Anat. Plants iv. i. iv. 155 The Distribution of the Threds which the Vessels compose, is not the Ramifying of Greater Pipes into Less.

1714 W. Salmon Ars Anatomica vii. 513/2 The Bronchia are always in the middle, above which is the Vein, and beneath the Pulmonick Artery, all which are carried and distributed with an equal and sociable ramifying.

1763 Med. Museum II. 61 These two systems are, to all appearance, the same..in their manner of ramifying.

1923 E. Wharton Son at Front iv. xxxv. 404 Up the tall stairs and through the ramifying of long white passages rose an unwonted rumour of sound.

1953 K. Burke Counter-statement (ed. 2) 158 Art, which expands by the ramifying of the Symbol, has the Symbol as a principle of selection.

2005 C. D. Foster Brit. Govt. in Crisis (front matter) The ramifying of a system of government which..is less interested in delivering results than managing news.

1743 tr. H. Boerhaave Acad. Lect. Theory Physic II. 154 By the Division of the larger Globules..as they strike against the Angles of the ramifying Arteries [L. ad angulos orientium ramorum].

1769 B. Alexander tr. G. B. Morgagni Seats & Causes Dis. III. iv. 334 Therein were eleven stones, most of them large and ramifying.

1796 D. Sutton Inoculator i. i. 25 I am decidedly of opinion, that some fecund, influencing principle..does exist..in certain ramifying capillary vessels.

1822 J. M. Good Study Med. III. 142 Fanaticism..may..rage with all the ramifying power of an epidemic.

1853 H. Winslow Elem. Intellect. Philos. (ed. 2) ii. iv. 110 Our fundamental idea of a nervous system includes a central organ..and a set of trunks and ramifying branches.

1895 Century Feb. 616/1 He exulted in the fact that he was chairman of a respectable association, with widely ramifying branches all over the country.

1910 Encycl. Brit. I. 293/2 This single principle of energy has transformed physical science by making possible the construction of a network of ramifying connexions between its various departments.

1937 Times 18 Dec. 13/7 There was arising a new class of small functionaries, agents of..the ramifying party organization.

1970 J. McPhee Crofter & Laird 49 Donald Gibbie and Angus the Post share a deep and ramifying antipathy.

2006 N.Y. Sun (Nexis) 19 July 13 The choice of subject is almost irrelevant, since it is merely the starting point for endlessly ramifying digressions.