star-spangled, ppl. a.
1. Spangled with stars.
| 1591 Sylvester Du Bartas i. ii. 1172 Above the Heavn's Star-spangled Canopy. a 1593 Marlowe Ovid's Elegies iii. ix. [x.] 21 He who rules the worlds starre-spangled towers. 1647 C. Harvey Schola Cordis xxxiii. 12 Thy piercing eye Whose light outvieth the star-spangled skie. 1777 Potter æschylus, Agamem. 234 Heaven's star-spangled plain. 1814 F. S. Key (title of song) The Star-spangled Banner. 1896 Baden-Powell Matabele Campaign vi, And then you take a last look at the glorious star-spangled ceiling overhead. |
2. star-spangled banner. a. The national flag of the United States of America. Also fig. Cf. stars and stripes s.v. star n.1 6 b.
| 1814 F. S. Key in Baltimore Patriot 20 Sept. 2/1 The star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave. 1843 Dickens Mart. Chuz. (1844) xxi. 261, I thank you, sir, in the name of the star-spangled banner of the Great United States. 1869 ‘Mark Twain’ Innoc. Abr. xlix. 515 A robe..that was a very star-spangled banner of curved and sinuous bars of black and white. 1887 ― Let. 18 Dec. (1917) II. 480 It had bought them of the star spangled banner Masterthief. 1949 Chicago Daily News 15 Dec. 3 Was the Star-Spangled Banner made in a brewery? |
b. With capital initials: the name of the U.S. national anthem.
| 1814 [see sense 1]. 1843 Quincy (Illinois) Herald 3 Mar. 1/1 It is a most beautiful history of that national ballad, ‘The Star Spangled Banner’. 1899 Kipling From Sea to Sea ii. xxv. 15 When we had chanted ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ not more than eight times, we adjourned. 1936 Nation 10 Oct. 419/2 As the band played the Star Spangled Banner at the end,..the President stood erect. 1977 G. Markstein Chance Awakening xliii. 128 He was on his feet..with 17,000 other people in the stadium as the Star Spangled Banner thundered out of the loudspeakers. |