▪ I. elaborate, pple. and a.
(ɪˈlæbərət)
[ad. L. ēlabōrāt-us, pa. pple. of ēlabōrāre to elaborate.]
† A. as pple. = elaborated: see elaborate v.
| 1581 Nowell & Day in Confer. i. (1584) G b, It was elaborate before, by the..studie of all the best learned Iesuites. |
B. as adj.
1. Produced or accomplished by labour. Also, that has been subjected to processes of art; = elaborated. Obs. or arch.
| 1592 Nashe P. Penilesse (ed. 2) 19 a, Some elaborate pollished Poems. 1607 Topsell Four-f. Beasts 27 The Gray..leaveth her elaborate house to the Fox. 1725 Pope Odyss. xiv. 360 The vast unnumber'd store Of steel elab'rate, and refulgent ore. 1779 Johnson L.P., Cowley, Wks. II. 65 He has no elegances either lucky or elaborate. 1814 Southey Roderick xxv. 152 Eyeing the elaborate steel. |
2. Worked out in much detail; highly finished.
| 1621 Burton Anat. Mel. ii. ii. iv. (1676) 176/1 Those elaborate Maps of Ortelius. 1687 Penal Laws 22 A..veneration for his Learned and Elabourate Works. 1704 Davenant in Ellis Orig. Lett. ii. 397 IV. 244, I had prepared a very elaborate letter to Her Royal Highness. 1862 Darwin Fertil. Orchids ii. 71 In the same flower we apparently have elaborate contrivances for directly opposed objects. 1875 Hamerton Intell. Life x. v. 393 In scientific pursuits the preparations are usually elaborate. 1875 Jowett Plato (ed. 2) I. 112 He then proceeds to give another and more elaborate explanation of the whole passage. |
b. Of an investigation, a study, an operation, etc.: Conducted with great minuteness. Hence transf. applied to personal agents or their attributes: Minutely careful, painstaking.
| 1649 Milton Eikon. iv. (1851) 362 The King was emphatical and elaborate on this Theam against Tumults. 1669 Gale Crt. Gentiles i. iii. ii. 28 Amongst the Ancients, none have spent more elaborate studies herein than Eusebius. 1728 Morgan Algiers I. iii. 37 He was a most curious and elaborate Collector of valuable Histories. 1782 V. Knox Ess. (1819) III. cxxxvii. 89 From the annals of the elaborate Maittaire. a 1836 W. Godwin Essays (1873) 193 The world is busy and elaborate to tear him from my recollection. 1871 Morley Voltaire (1886) 86 He read Shakespeare, and made an elaborate study of his method. |
▪ II. elaborate, v.
(ɪˈlæbəreɪt)
[f. L. ēlabōrāt- ppl. stem of ēlabōrāre to work out, produce by labour, f. ē out + labōrāre to labour.
Sense 2 may probably be the earliest in Eng. from the use of the L. word by writers on alchemy or medicine. Cf. Fr. élaborer, 16th c. (Littré) = sense 2.]
1. To produce or develop by the application of labour; to fashion (a product of art or industry) from the raw material; to work out in detail, give finish or completeness to (an invention, a theory, literary or artistic work, etc.).
| 1611 Cotgr., Elabourer, to elaborate. 1626 Cockeram, Elaborate, to do a thing with great paines. 1726 Young Love Fame Wks. (1866) II. 96 Attend, and you discern it [ambition] in the fair Conduct a finger, Or, in full joy, elaborate a sigh. 1846 Ruskin Mod. Paint. (1848) I. ii. i. vii. §12 85 The objects of landscape may be either elaborated or suggested according to their place and claim. 1850 Gladstone Glean. V. cx. 238 The constitutional system which was in course of being gradually elaborated and matured. 1865 Lecky Ration. (1878) II. v. 199 He elaborates his theory from his own reason. 1875 Jowett Plato (ed. 2) III. 390 Little things are elaborated with an infinity of pains. |
2. transf. Of nature or natural agencies: To produce (a chemical substance) from (its) elements or sources; to fashion or develop (an animal or vegetable tissue, etc.); also, to transmute (crude materials) into a developed product.
| 1607 T. Walkington Opt. Glass. 54 Nothing elaborates our concoction more then sleepe. 1665–9 Boyle Occas. Refl. (1675) 65 Honey..is elaborated by the Bee. 1671 J. Webster Metallogr. iv. 81 If the waters be saltish, pure and clear,..then a pure Metal is generated; but in defect of purity an Impure Metal, in elaborating of which, Nature spreadeth..a thousand years. 1744 Berkeley Siris §87 The animal spirits are elaborated from the blood. 1828 H. Steuart Planter's G. 211 As well might it be imagined, that the roots elaborate it [the sap] in the leaves. 1834 Southey Doctor lxxvi. (1862) 161 The Sun, under whose influence one plant elaborates nutriment for man and another poison. 1870 H. Macmillan Bible Teach. x. 194 Year after year..the leaf is elaborating from air and rain and sunshine..those solid structures which are destined to outlive it. |
3. intr. To become elaborate.
| 1876 H. Spencer Princ. Sociol. I. §103 This custom elaborates as social development goes through its earlier stages. 1903 R. Langbridge Flame & Flood xx, These [sc. preparations] she discovered had augmented and elaborated to a considerable extent. |
Add: [1.] b. intr. To explain something in detail; also, to enlarge or expatiate on.
| 1934 Webster s.v., Elaborate, to dwell at length upon a theme. 1970 D. Jacobson Rape of Tamar iv. 53, I don't need to elaborate on how difficult it was for anything clandestine to take place in that part of the palace. 1984 P. Ackroyd T. S. Eliot iii. 75 He did not develop as a ‘thinker’: he merely elaborated on the implications of his previous convictions. 1987 Nucleonics Week 17 Dec. 9 Neither Bryne nor a SMUD spokesperson elaborated. |