▪ I. crude, a.
(kruːd)
[ad. L. crūd-us raw, undigested, unripe, rough, cruel.]
1. a. In the natural or raw state; ‘not changed by any process or preparation’ (J.); not manufactured, refined, tempered, etc.; of bricks, unbaked.
| c 1386 Chaucer Can. Yeom. Prol. & T. 219 In amalgamynge, and calcenynge Of quyksilver, y-clept mercury crude. 1555 Eden Decades 179 [Gold] is so muche the baser, fouler, and more crude. 1666 Boyle Formes & Qual. 134 All these Vitriols, especially that of crude Lead. 1747 Wesley Prim. Physick (1762) 108 Dissolve a Dram of crude Sal Ammoniac. 1822 J. Imison Sc. & Art II. 115 An ore called crude Antimony, which is a Sulphuret of antimony. 1862 Rawlinson Anc. Mon. I. v. 92 Sometimes the crude and the burnt brick were used in alternate layers. 1883 Eng. Illust. Mag. Nov. 89/1 Spelter in the crude form of calamine stone. |
b. crude oil, natural mineral oil. So crude petroleum.
| 1865 Atlantic Monthly XV. 389 Wagons laden with crude oil for the refinery. 1896 B. Redwood Petroleum I. 215 The crude oil of Upper Burma. Ibid., The solid hydrocarbons present in crude petroleum. 1931 Discovery Nov. 350/1 Crude-oil rail traction is the successor to steam rail traction. 1970 Times 16 Apr. 14/5 The tar lumps are residues of crude oil. |
c. crude fibre, the insoluble residue left when vegetable matter is boiled alternately in dilute acids and alkalis, corresponding roughly to its indigestible part.
| 1895 C. F. Cross et al. Cellulose 165 ‘Crude Fibre’.— ‘Rohfaser’. 1910 Encycl. Brit. V. 606/2 In the analysis of fodder plants.. the residue obtained after successive acid and alkaline hydrolysis is the ‘crude fibre’ of the agricultural chemist. 1927 R. G. Linton Anim. Nutrition & Vet. Dietetics i. 9 As obtained by ordinary analysis, crude fibre is a mixture of cellulose, lignin, cutin, pentosans, etc. 1965 Brit. Poultry Sci. VI. 23/2 There is little detailed information concerning crude fibre digestion by poultry. |
† 2. Of food: Raw, uncooked. Obs.
| 1542 Boorde Dyetary ix. (1870) 250 Of eatynge of crude meate. 1586 Cogan Haven Health ccxiii. (1636) 225 He never eat any crude or raw thing, as fruits, herbs. 1658 Sir T. Browne Tracts i. Scripture Plants, Meal of crude and unparched corn. 1796 Hull Advertiser 23 Apr. 1/4 The inside [of the potato] will be nearly in a crude state. |
3. a. Of food in the stomach, secretions, ‘humours’: Not, or not fully, digested or ‘concocted’.
| 1533 Elyot Cast. Helthe ii. ix, Rape rootes..if they be not perfectly concoct in the stomake, they do make crude or raw iuice in the veynes. 1668 Culpepper & Cole Barthol. Anat. i. ix. 18 The Venter and the Reticulum..are ordained to hold the crude meat. 1789 W. Buchan Dom. Med. (1790) 635 Which induces a languid circulation, a crude indigested mass of humours. 1851 Carpenter Man. Phys. 322 In the higher Plants, the ascending or crude sap is to be distinguished from the elaborated or descending sap. |
† b. transf. Characterized by or affected with indigestion; lacking power to digest. Obs.
| 1605 B. Jonson Volpone ii. i, To fortifie the most indigest and crude stomack. 1634 Milton Comus 476 A perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets, Where no crude surfeit reigns. 1671 ― P.R. iv. 328 Deep versed in books and shallow in himself, Crude or intoxicate, collecting toys, And trifles. |
4. Of fruit: Unripe; sour or harsh to the taste.
| 1555 Eden Decades 263 Crude thynges are in shorte tyme made rype. 1637 Milton Lycidas 3, I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude. 1737 West Let. in Gray's Poems (1775) 20 Or, ere the grapes their purple hue betray, Tear the crude cluster from the mourning spray. 1853 C. Brontë Let. in Mrs. Gaskell Life xxvi. 418 As the..wasp attacks the sweetest and mellowest fruit, eschewing what is sour and crude. |
5. Of a disease, morbid growth, etc.: In an early or undeveloped stage; not matured.
| 1651 R. Wittie Primrose's Pop. Errours iv. 225 In diseases that are crude, and hard to bee concocted. 1727–51 Chambers Cycl. s.v. Crudity, That state of the disease, wherein the crude matter is changed, and rendered less peccant..is called digestion, concoction, or maturation. 1847 Todd Cycl. Anat. IV. 107 Tubercle having subsisted for a..time in the firm (or, as it is called, crude) state. |
6. Of products of the mind: Not matured, not completely thought out or worked up; ill-digested.
| 1611 B. Jonson Catiline Ded., Against all noise of opinion; from whose crude and airy reports, I appeal to the..singular faculty of judgement in your lordship. 1646 E. Pagitt Heresiogr. (ed. 3) 71 Being tyed to the ex tempore and crude Prayers of the Ministers. 1749 Berkeley Let. Wks. IV. 323, I have thrown together these few crude thoughts for you to ruminate upon. 1826 Disraeli Viv. Grey v. vii, The crude opinions of an unpractised man. 1848 Macaulay Hist. Eng. II. 654 Hasty and crude legislation on subjects so grave could not but produce new grievances. |
7. a. Of literary or artistic work: Lacking finish, or maturity of treatment; rough, unpolished.
| 1763 Mallet in Crit. Review (in Boswell Johnson) The crude efforts of envy, petulance, and self conceit. 1786 Sir J. Reynolds Disc. xiii, No Architect took greater care than he [Vanbrugh] that his work should not appear crude and hard. 1831 Lamb Elia, Ellistoniana, In elegies, that shall silence this crude prose. 1875 Fortnum Majolica iii. 30 The design, crude and wanting in relief. |
b. Of natural objects: Coarse, clumsy.
| a 1828 Campbell Poems, Power of Russia vi, But Russia's limbs..Are crude, and too colossal to cohere. 1853 Kane Grinnell Exp. iii. (1856) 28 A school of fin-backed whales, great, crude, wallowing sea-hogs. |
8. Of action or statement: Rough, rude, blunt, not qualified by amenity.
| 1650 Jer. Taylor Serm., Return of Prayers iii, John Huss..for the crude delivery of this truth was sentenced by the council of Constance. 1670 Cotton Espernon iii. x. 510 Surpriz'd at so slight, and so crude an answer. |
9. a. Of persons: Characterized by crudeness of thought, feeling, action, or character.
| 1722–4 Swift Maxims contr. Ireland, Errors committed by crude and short thinkers. 1837 Lytton E. Maltrav. i. xvi, A crude or sarcastic unbeliever. 1876 Geo. Eliot Dan. Der. iv. xxviii, A cruder lover would have lost the view of her pretty ways and attitudes. |
b. Of manners or behaviour: Unpolished, ‘rude’.
| 1876 T. Hardy Hand Ethelb. xiii, To correct a small sister of somewhat crude manners as regards filling the mouth. |
10. Gram. Applied to a word in its uninflected state, or to that part which is independent of inflexion; esp. in crude form, the uninflected form or stem of a word.
| 1805 Colebrooke Gram. Skr. Lang. I. 129 The root, or theme, denominated dhātu, consists of the radical letters, disjoined from the affixes and augments. It may be called a crude verb. 1808 Sir C. Wilkins Gram. Skr. Lang. 36. 1830 G. Long Observ. Study Gr. & Lat. Lang. 37 λιθο, λογο, must be considered as the roots, or rather the crude forms, both in the formation of the cases, and in that of the compounds. 1844 B. H. Kennedy Lat. Gram. Curric. 129 Besides this root, common to all words of one kindred, every word has a Crude-form or Stem, which represents it independently of any relation to other words. 1875 Whitney Life Lang. iii. 41 The base or crude-form of an adjective as adverb. |
11. Statistics. Unadjusted; not corrected by reference to modifying circumstances; spec. crude birth-, crude death-rate, the total figures before adjustment.
| 1889 Jrnl. R. Statistical Soc. LII. 442 The merest tyro in statistics knows that crude gross numbers are of little value. 1896 Lancet 15 Aug. 479/1 The mean crude or uncorrected death-rate. Ibid. 479/2 The range of corrected death-rates is far wider than that of crude death-rates. 1945 New Biol. I. 30 A crude birth-rate is the annual number of births per thousand living persons. Ibid. 36 Determination of the standard mortality rate, as opposed to the crude death-rate, is a simple matter if we know the age composition of the population and specific mortality rates for each year of life. 1965 Times 13 Feb. 8/3 These are crude figures, with exports valued f.o.b. and imports c.i.f. |
▪ II. crude, n.
(kruːd)
[f. the adj.]
Crude oil (see prec., 1 b).
| 1904 Encycl. Americana XII, s.v. Petroleum Industry, The crude..might be found in paying quantities if artesian wells were sunk. 1921 J. E. Pogue Econ. Petroleum 79 The details of a complete refinery differ according to the type of crude employed. Ibid. 82 Asphaltic crudes such as those of the Gold Coast. 1960 Times 11 Apr. 15/5 In 1959 French bottoms carried almost 90 per cent. of the crude reaching France from all sources. 1970 R. Johnston Black Camels v. 86 We might be thankful for that crude to feed the refinery. |