buoyant, a.
(ˈbɔɪənt, bwɔɪ-)
Also 6 boyent, 7 boyant.
[perhaps ad. Sp. boyante in same sense, or OF. bouyant (app. also synonymous, though explained differently in Godef.); in Eng. it is app. older than buoy v. See -ant1.]
1. Having the power of floating, tending to float; floating.
| 1578 W. Bourne Treas. for Trav. iv. x, The syde [of a ship] being rounde and full, it is the more boyenter a great deale. 1713 Derham Phys. Theol. 442 note, The Air-Bladder [of a fish] makes the Body more or less buoyant. 1765 Wilkinson in Phil. Trans. LV. 98 The buoyant power of cork in fresh water. 1792 Gentl. Mag. Mar. 210 Produced from seed buoyant in the atmosphere. 1835–6 Todd Cycl. Anat. & Phys. I. 40/2 Filled with air, which renders the whole animal so buoyant that it floats on the surface. |
b. Lightly elastic.
| 1835–6 Todd Cycl. Anat. & Phys. I. 70/1 The quick and buoyant motions of the lively child. |
c. fig. Tending to rise or keep up.
| c 1661 Mrq. Argyle's Will, &c. in Harl. Misc. (1746) VIII. 30/2 His Vices were most notorious and boyant. 1808 Syd. Smith Wks. (1869) 112 Religion is so noble and powerful a consideration—it is so buoyant and so unsubmergible. 1868 Rogers Pol. Econ. xxi. (ed. 3) 282 That part of the public revenue is most buoyant. |
2. Of liquid: Having the power of keeping bodies afloat on its surface.
| 1692 Dryden Eleonora Ded. (Globe), The water under me was buoyant. 1813 Byron Br. Abydos ii. iii, These limbs that buoyant wave hath borne. 1873 Morley Rousseau I. 324 The buoyant waters of emotion and sentiment. |
3. fig. Of the spirits: Easily recovering from depression, elastic, light. Of persons: Light-hearted, cheerful, hopeful.
| a 1748 Thomson Wks. (1766) I. 130 Nerves..full of buoyant spirit. 1770 Langhorne Plutarch (1879) I. 211/1 A man of buoyant and animated valour. 1824 W. Irving T. Trav. I. 338 My spirits were most buoyant after a temporary prostration. 1843 Prescott Mexico (1850) I. 198 His buoyant spirits were continually breaking out in troublesome frolics. 1845 S. Austin Ranke's Hist. Ref. I. i. 105 The buoyant confidence of youth. |
4. Comb., as buoyant-minded adj.
| 1833 H. Martineau Charm. Sea iii. 27 One or two of the..more buoyant-minded of the party. |