middlemost, a. Now somewhat rare.
(ˈmɪd(ə)lməʊst)
[f. middle a. + -most.]
That is in the very middle, or nearest the middle. Now only with reference to position; formerly also with reference to age, size, quality, etc. Cf. midmost and middlest superl. of middle a.
| a 1300 Cursor M. 10023 Þe baile midelmast o thre, Bitakens wel hir chastite. a 1400 Isumbras 184 His medilmast sone ȝit lefte he thare. 14.. in Rel. Ant. I. 52 Tak the rote of walwort..and do away the overmast rynd, and tak the mydilmaste rynde. 1577–87 Holinshed Chron. I. 14/2 Cunedag the sonne of Hennius and Ragaie (middlemost daughter of Leir before mentioned). 1638 Junius Paint. Ancients 282 Although it require great skill to paint the bodie and middlemost parts of figures, yet [etc.]. 1658 Rowland Moufet's Theat. Ins. 952 For there are these several sorts of them, the bigger, lesser, middlemost and least. 1671 H. M. tr. Erasm. Colloq. 14 My middlemost son hath lately entred into holy Orders. 1721 Mortimer Husb. II. 222 The undermost part of the middlemost Joints are to be cut off half through. 1812 J. Bigland Beauties Eng. & Wales XVI. 517 Folding gates, the middlemost of which is of iron. 1862 Borrow Wild Wales xxiii. (1901) 72/1 Three men—the middlemost was praying in Welsh. |
b. absol. The part in the middle.
| 1382 Wyclif Matt. Prol. 1 In the whiche gospel it is profitable to men desyrynge God, so to knowe the first, the mydmeste [MS. O mydelmest] other the last. 1673 Penn Chr. Quaker vii. (1699) 60 God himself inhabits the Lowest, and Highest, and the Middlemost. |