macadamize, v.
(məˈkædəmaɪz)
Also M{supc}Adamise, -ize.
[f. macadam + -ize.]
1. trans. To make or repair (a road) according to J. L. M{supc}Adam's system, which consists in laying down successive layers of stone broken into pieces of nearly uniform size, each layer being allowed to consolidate under the pressure of ordinary wheel traffic before the next is laid upon it.
See M{supc}Adam's pamphlet, Remarks on the Present System of Road-Making (ed. 5, 1822). He did not approve of the placing of any kind of foundation under the layers of stone, of the use of sand or gravel as ‘binding’ material, or of the smoothing of the surface by heavy rollers; though the name of ‘macadamizing’ is now often given to methods in which some or all of these practices are admitted.
| 1826 Lion Hunting 78 The road..was what we now deemed a great luxury,—M‘Adamized, instead of paved. 1828 Southey To A. Cunningham 23 A street not yet Macadamized. 1863 A. C. Ramsay Phys. Geog. (1878) 613 Basalts..are ill adapted for macadamising roads. 1871 L. Stephen Playgr. Eur. (1894) 135 A heap of granite stones prepared for macadamising a road. |
| absol. 1871 M. Collins Mrq. & Merch. I. vi. 188 There is no hard stone nearer than Mount Sorel, so they macadamize with something almost as soft as loaf sugar. |
b. fig. To render level or even; to level, raze.
| 1826 J. Sherman in Mem. (1863) 219 Grace indeed macadamises the road, makes the stones smaller. 1827 Jelf Let. to Pusey in Liddon, etc. Life P. (1893) I. 117 Your mind is certainly macadamized; mine resembles the road between this [Berlin] and Strelitz. 1829 Marryat F. Mildmay iii, The enemy's centre should have been macadamised by our seven three-deckers. 1842 J. W. Orderson Creol. iv. 38 Our..Bishop has..macadamized the way for his successor. 1868 Peard Water-Farm. ii. 14 Each successful labour of to-day will macadamise the road for to-morrow. |
2. To convert into road-metal.
| 1841 J. T. J. Hewlett Parish Clerk II. 154 Coarse, thick slates, that would certainly have been macadamized in these days as excellent materials for road-making. |
b. transf. and
fig. To break up (something hard or figured as being hard)
into pieces. ?
Obs.| 1825 Good Study Med. (ed. 2) V. 539 By grinding, or as we should now perhaps call it macadamizing the stone into granules. 1825 New Monthly Mag. XV. 296 In Macadamizing a few broad, simple, and impressive sounds into passages of numberless rapid notes, there is no time left for giving the emphasis required. 1852 Smedley L. Arundel xxxvi. 270 Richard Frere..devoted himself to that indurated specimen of the original granite formation,..and by trying to mac⁓adamise her into small-talk [etc.]. 1855 ― H. Coverdale i. 2 Fathers have flinty hearts, and even the amenities of the nineteenth century have failed to macadamise them. |