‖ furor
(ˈfjʊərɔː(r))
Forms: 5 fourour, fureur, 5–6 furour(e, 6– furor.
[L.; originally a. F. fureur, ad. L. furōr-em, n. of state f. furĕre to rage, be mad.]
1. Fury, rage, madness, anger, mania.
| c 1477 Caxton Jason 22 b, Considerest thou not the strengthe and force of my body and the furour of my swerde? 1489 ― Faytes of A. iii. xxi. 219 A madde man duryng his fourour may not be reputed nor taken for enemye. 1509 Barclay Shyp of Folys (1570) 70 Where..wrath doth reigne with his furours. 1525 Ld. Berners Froiss. II. xlvii. 162 Some oppressed..with the furoure of the see. a 1541 Wyatt To his unkind love Poet. Wks. (1861) 46 What rage is this? what furor? of what kind? 1561 T. Norton Calvin's Inst. iii. 191 Hoping that the Lord mighte be..turned from the furor of hys wrath. 1603 Sir C. Heydon Jud. Astrol. ii. 85 The furors of Nero. 1758 H. Walpole Catal. Roy. Authors (1759) II. 122 A Lord, who with..some derangement of his intellects was so unlucky as not to have his furor of the true poetic sort. 1801 Fuseli in Lect. Paint. iii. (1848) 413 The enthusiastic furor of the God of War. 1837 Carlyle Fr. Rev. II. ii. vi, In mixed terror and furor. 1862 Maurice Mor. & Met. Philos. IV. vi. §5. 209 The anti-papal furor of the king's youth. |
2. The inspired frenzy of poets and prophets; in weaker sense, a ‘glow’, excited mood.
| 1589 Puttenham Eng. Poesie i. i. (Arb.) 20 This science in his perfection can not grow, but by some diuine instinct, the Platonicks call it furor. 1757 Foote Author i. 13, I am afraid the poetic Furor may have betray'd me into some Indecency. 1837 Carlyle Fr. Rev. I. iv. i. (1872) 102 Rises into furor almost Pythic. 1856 R. A. Vaughan Mystics (1860) I. 218 Of these two kinds of divining..the latter is [characterized] by a fervency and elevation such as the ancients styled furor. 1860 Geo. Eliot in Life (1885) II. 159 They [the pages] were written in a furor; but I dare say there is not a word different from what it would have been, if I had written them at the slowest pace. |
3. Great enthusiasm or excitement, a ‘rage’ or craze which takes every one by storm. Now chiefly N. Amer. (Cf. next.)
| 1704 Swift Mech. Operat. Spirit Misc. (1711) 301 He seldom was without some female Patients among them, for the furor. 1865 Cornh. Mag. July 100 Like most old churches, Earndale had suffered under the beautifying furor of the eighteenth century. 1868 M. Pattison Academ. Org. v. 316 The mastery which the athletic furor has established over all minds in this place. |
4. Sometimes with L. adj. added to define the nature of the ‘frenzy’, as furor academicus, furor biographicus, furor papisticus, furor poeticus, furor teutonicus. Also furor scribendi.
| 1850 Kingsley A. Locke I. xx. 278 Mackaye grumbled at my writing so much, and so fast, and sneered about the furor scribendi. a 1873 Mill Ess. Relig. (1874) 33 The fire of London, which is believed to have had so salutary an effect on the healthiness of the city, would have produced that effect just as much if it had been really the work of the ‘furor papisticus’ so long commemorated on the Monument. 1922 A. Huxley Let. 8 June (1969) 207 His parents-in-law elect are extremely averse to being anything more than elect—on the score, I gather, of poor Robert's..furious furor poeticus. 1928 Daily Tel. 11 Sept. 12/1 Once upon a time Macaulay complained of the furor biographicus or lues Boswelliana which makes biographies an orgy of praise. 1960 Times 2 Dec. 20/6 From the early furor teutonicus to the present mood of lyric vitality, the achievement..is impressive. 1963 P. H. Johnson Night & Silence v. 27 The man was obviously wild with excitement, with furor academicus. 1964 F. Bowers Bibliogr. & Textual Crit. v. iv. 151 A balance that is sometimes neglected in the furor poeticus of textual speculation. 1964 Economist 31 Oct. 507/1 The obsessive furor scribendi which..drove him to proliferate lectures, addresses and prefaces. |