turgidity
(tɜːˈdʒɪdɪtɪ)
[f. L. turgid-us (see prec.) + -ity.]
1. The state of being turgid or swollen.
| 1732 Arbuthnot Rules of Diet iii. in Aliments, etc. 363 Weakness, Wateryness and Turgidity of the eyes. 1820 Jefferson Writ. (1830) IV. 323 The tendency to turgidity may proceed from debility alone. 1854 Jones & Siev. Pathol. Anat. (1874) 255 Turgidity of the blood-vessels. 1875 Bennett & Dyer Sachs' Bot. 700 By Turgidity we understand the hydrostatic pressure which the water absorbed by endosmose exercises equally on all sides on the cell-wall. |
2. fig. Inflation of language; grandiloquence, pomposity, bombast; also with a and pl. an example of this.
| 1756–82 J. Warton Ess. Pope (ed. 4) I. iii. 103 Obscurity or turgidity, and a false grandeur of diction. 1788 Lond. Mag. 247 They appear to abound with turgidities, and, if they can be called splendid, to dazzle by their splendour. 1827 Hare Guesses Ser. i. (1847) 62 The empty turgidity of Dryden. 1903 Edin. Rev. Apr. 320 We are willing to forget the latter turgidities [of a poem]. |