torpid, a. (n.)
(ˈtɔːpɪd)
Also 7 torpide.
[ad. L. torpid-us benumbed, f. torpē-re to be numb.]
1. Benumbed; deprived or devoid of the power of motion or feeling; in which activity, animation, or development is suspended; dormant.
| 1613 Purchas Pilgrimage i. v. 22 If he descend not lower, to become torpide and lifelesse. 1621 Burton Anat. Mel. i. iii. iii. i, Drinesse, which makes the nerues of the tongue torpid. 1784 Cowper Task iii. 468 When..November dark Checks vegetation in the torpid plant Expos'd to his cold breath. 1860 Emerson Cond. Life, Fate Wks. (Bohn) II. 323 Some animals became torpid in winter, others were torpid in summer. |
b. Path. Sluggish in action or function.
| 1807 Med. Jrnl. XVII. 72 Complaints of phlegmatic and torpid constitutions. 1843 Sir C. Scudamore Med. Visit Gräfenberg 41 Digestive functions torpid. 1899 Allbutt's Syst. Med. VIII. 477 Gout and tendency to torpid liver. |
2. fig. Wanting in animation or vigour; inactive; slow, sluggish; dull; stupefied; apathetic.
| 1656 Blount Glossogr., Torpid, slow, dull, drowzy, astonied. a 1677 Hale Prim. Orig. Man. i. ii. 63 They [connatural principles] lye more torpid, and inactive, and inevident. 1703 T. N. City & C. Purchaser 92 The Workmen are taken to be torpid Operators. 1764 Goldsm. Trav. 171 No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array. 1778 Johnson 9 Apr., in Boswell, It is a man's own fault..if his mind grows torpid in old age. 1834 Macaulay Ess., Pitt (1865) I. 293/2 To a small, a torpid, and an unfriendly audience. 1885 Dunckley in Manch. Weekly Times 7 Feb. 5/5 In the counties..the population is comparatively torpid and inert. |
3. Causing torpidity; torporific. rare.
| 1830 Whittier Frost Spirit iv, The Frost Spirit comes! and the quiet lake shall feel The torpid touch of his glazing breath, and ring to the skater's heel. |
B. n.
1. At Oxford: (pl.) The races rowed in Lent term in eight-oared clinker-built open boats: originally designating the boats; later also the crews.
‘The {oqq}Torpid boats{cqq} were originally the second boats of a college, which until 1837 rowed with the {oqq}Eights{cqq}. They are understood to have started c 1827, when Christ Church put a second boat on the river; but no record of the name has been found till 1838, when it was app. well established. In that year, the Torpids were made a class by themselves, and raced in the days between the Eight-oared Races (which were not then continuous). In 1852 they were moved to the Lent Term, and reorganized on their present basis.’ (W. E. Sherwood.)
| 1838 Trin. Coll. Boat Club Bk., It was determined at a meeting of Strokes that no Torpid should put on with the racing boats. 1839 Oxford Herald 31 May, A race between the Torpids, or second crews, took place on Thursday Evening. 1839 O.U.B.C. President's Bk., [After the Chart of] The Eights [is one of] The Torpid Races. 1853 ‘C. Bede’ Verdant Green ii. vi, The little gentleman..did not join with the ‘Torpids’ (as the second boats of a college are called). 1861 Hughes Tom Brown at Oxf. xxvii, The torpids being filled with the refuse of the rowing-men—generally awkward or very young oarsmen. 18.. Inscr. on picture of Exeter White Boat in O.U.B.C. barge, ‘Presented..by the Honourable John Joclyn, late of Exeter College, and stroke oar of the Torpid in 1827’. 1866 Oxf. Undergraduates' Jrnl. 20 Brasenose went head in Torpids as well as Eights. 1869 Bradwood O.V.H. (1870) 4 He had..done two years hard duty in the college torpid. 1910 Westm. Gaz. 24 Feb. 4/1 Oxford ‘Torpids’..were so named about 1827, when Christ Church staggered humanity by putting a second crew on the river. |
2. At Harrow: see quots.
| 1903 Farmer & Henley Slang Dict., Torpid (Harrow), a boy who has not been two years in the school. 1905 H. A. Vachell The Hill ii. 39 Scaife expects us to be Torpids. [Note] Boys [at Harrow] who have not been more than two years in the school are eligible as ‘torpids’; out of each house a Torpid football eleven is chosen. |
C. Comb. a. of the adj., as torpid-minded; b. of the n., as Torpid eight, torpid-race.
| 1884 Pall Mall G. 19 Feb. (Farmer), Twenty-six *Torpid eights were out at Oxford in training for the races. |
| 1909 Nation 18 Sept. 878/2 The average man..may be..less ignorant and *torpid-minded than in the older countries. |
| 1858 ‘M. Splene’ Almæ Matres 49, I see myself now..pulling for very life in the *torpid-race. |
Hence ˈtorpidly adv., in a torpid manner; ˈtorpidness, torpidity, torpor.
| a 1677 Hale Prim. Orig. Man. i. i. 3 It keeps it from rust and torpidness. 1820 C. R. Maturin Melmoth (1892) III. xxvii. 107 The aged father and mother, retreating torpidly to their seats. 1831 E. J. Trelawny Adv. Younger Son xii, A death-like torpidness came over me. 1845 Day tr. Simon's Anim. Chem. I. 227 The torpidly circulating blood. |