hazy, a.
(ˈheɪzɪ)
Forms: 7 hawsey, heysey, hasie, -ey, haizy, 8 hazey, 7– hazy.
[In form, as if from haze n. + -y; but known nearly a century before the n., so that their mutual relation is uncertain. The early forms also offer difficulty.]
1. Of the atmosphere, weather, etc.: Characterized by the presence of haze; misty. (orig. Naut.) In 17–18th c. use = foggy; but now usually applied to a kind of atmospheric indistinctness less determinate than mist or fog, and often caused by heat.
| 1625 Impeachm. Dk. Buckhm. (Camden) 7 The weather beeing thicke and hawsey, the winde highe. 1657 R. Ligon Barbadoes (1673) 27 Moistness of the Air..which the Seamen call a Heysey weather..as though the Sun shine out bright, yet we cannot see his body, till nine a clock. 1665 J. Webb Stone-Heng (1725) 183 An hasie Morning. 1666 Phil. Trans. I. 241 The Air being light, though moist and a little hazy. 1694 Acc. Sev. Late Voy. ii. (1711) 2 The Air was haizy and full of fogs and snow, so that we could not see far. a 1700 B. E. Dict. Cant. Crew, Hazy Weather, when it is Thick, Misty, Foggy. 1748 Anson's Voy. i. vii. 72 We had little wind, with thick hazy weather. 1799 Vince Elem. Astron. xxi. (1810) 231 A diffused light, which made the air seem hazy. 1856 Stanley Sinai & Pal. i. (1858) 64 It was too hazy to see anything in the distance. |
2. fig. Lacking intellectual distinctness; vague, indistinct, uncertain.
| 1831 Lamb Elia Ser. ii. Newspapers 35 Yrs. Ago, A hazy uncertain delicacy. 1862 Burton Bk.-Hunter (1863) 35 His communications about the material wants of life were hazy. 1865 Dickens Mut. Fr. iii. iii, Some hazy idea. 1874 L. Stephen Hours in Library (1892) II. vii. 211 The chief article of Rousseau's rather hazy creed. |
b. Somewhat confused with drink. colloq.
| 1824 T. Hook Sayings & Doings Ser. i. Friend of Family II. 10 Hazy, Sir ― You understand? smoking and drinking. 1842 Barham Ingol. Leg. Ser. ii. St. Cuthbert, Staggering about just as if he were ‘hazy’. |