ˈtwo-year-old, a. and n.
A. adj. Of the age of two years. Chiefly of animals, esp. colts.
| 1601 in T. Pont's Topogr. Acc. Cunningham (Maitland Cl.) 180 Item, ane twa ȝeir auld bull. c 1686 Depred. Clan Campbell (1816) 31 [Three] tuo year old stots. 1805 R. W. Dickson Pract. Agric. II. 1176 Young horses, as two-year old colts. 1835 Jekyll Corr. (1894) 338 The two-year-old person on the throne of Spain. 1838 Penny Cycl. XII. 307/2 A three-year-old colt has his form and energies much more developed than a two-year-old one. |
B. n. a. An animal (esp. a colt) or child of two years of age. Also attrib.
| 1594–5 Durham Wills (Surtees) II. 254, iiij kyne and their calves, and fowre two-yere oldes. a 1600 in T. Pont's Topogr. Acc. Cunningham (Maitland Cl.) 178 Item, xiiij ȝoing beystis,..four twa ȝeir auldis and five ane ȝeir auld. c 1686 Depred. Clan Campbell (1816) 57 Nyne great coues, 2 tuo year olds. 1831 Youatt Horse viii. 141 Is it possible to give this mouth to an early two-year-old? 1856 H. H. Dixon Post & Paddock iii. 56 Two-year-old racing lays the seeds of infirmity. Ibid. iii. 79 Very few two-year-olds were then trained. 1895 P. Hemingway Out of Egypt i. iv. 46 The two-year-old [child] regarded him wonderingly. |
b. As the type of a youthful and energetic person.
| 1912 Punch 19 June 470/1 Feeling as he did like a two-year-old, he was convinced that an immeasurable advantage to the country would be gained by placing the ballot in the hands of babies. 1928 Galsworthy Swan Song iii. xvi. 342 Mr. Forsyte was a proper wonder—went at it like a two-year old. 1936 [see stinker 6 c]. |