recurring, ppl. a.
(rɪˈkɜːrɪŋ)
[-ing2.]
1. That recurs, in senses of the vb.
| a 1711 Ken Hymnarium Poet. Wks. 1721 II. 32 Throughout his annual and re-curring Race, He never stops, but always changes Place. 1804–6 Syd. Smith Mor. Philos. (1850) 168 Every recurring year contributes its remedy to these infringements on justice and good sense. 1851 J. Paget Lect. Tumours v. 55/2 For one group, the name of ‘Recurring Fibroid Tumours’ may, for the present, suffice. 1875 Jowett Plato (ed. 2) III. 277 The various letters in all their recurring sizes and combinations. |
b. With prefixed advbs., as ever-recurring, oft-recurring, still-recurring.
| 1832 Tennyson Sonn., Caress'd or chidden, Fancy came..And chased away the still-recurring gnat. 1850 R. G. Cumming Hunter's Life S. Africa (1902) 98/2 The greater part of the forest consisting of the ever-recurring wait-a-bits. 1861 M. Pattison Ess. (1889) I. 45 The Great Hall, serving..as a banqueting-room for the oft-recurring festivities. |
2. spec. a. Math. recurring curve, a curve which returns upon itself. recurring decimal: see decimal n. 2. recurring series (see quot. 1797).
| 1715 tr. Gregory's Astron. v. i. Prop. 2 II. 698 Kepler did not like Circles or other recurring Curves for the Motion of Comets. 1797 Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3) XVII. 297/1 Recurring series, a series of which any term is formed by the addition of a certain number of preceding terms, multiplied or divided by any determinate numbers whether positive or negative. 1801 Ibid. Suppl. I. 483/2 Circulating Decimals, called also recurring or repeating decimals. 1841 Penny Cycl. XIX. 342/1 Some use may thus be made of recurring series in various questions of the theory of probabilities. 1886 Pendlebury Arith. §181 Such a decimal as ·1.42857. , in which all digits recur, is called a pure recurring decimal. |
b. Path. recurring utterances, a form of aphasia, marked by the repetition of certain words or phrases.
| 1892 Tuke Dict. Psych. Med. II. 1074/1. 1899 Allbutt's Syst. Med. VIII. 411 The articulation of such words or ‘recurring utterances’, as they are now commonly termed. |
So reˈcurring vbl. n., a returning.
| 1748 Richardson Clarissa (1811) VI. 347 Recurrings there will be; hankerings, that will, on every, but remotely-favourable incident..pop up. |