breathed, ppl. a.
[f. breathe v. and breath n. + -ed. In early instances it is not easy to separate the verbal from the noun-derivative, nor to fix the pronunciation.]
I. From the vb. (now briːðd, ˈbriːðɪd).
1. Exercised, put into breath, in (good) wind; esp. in well-breathed, and the like.
| 1430 Lydg. Chron. Troy i. vi, Though he be best brethed to endure. 1525 Ld. Berners Froiss. II. cxxxvi. [cxxxii.] 380 Rode forthe an easy passe to kepe their horses well brethed. 1596 Shakes. Tam. Shr. Induct. ii, Thy gray⁓hounds are as swift As breathed Stags. 1637 Heywood Roy. King v. ix. Wks. 1874 VI. 79 The Falcon better breath'd, seiz'd on the Eagle. 1678 R. Lestrange Seneca's Mor. (1702) 343 A Footman that is not breath'd, cannot keep pace with his Master's Horse. 1704 Pope Windsor F. 121 To plains with well-breath'd beagles we repair. |
b. fig. † lust-breathed (in Shakes.): animated or inspired by lust, or breathing lust (cf. well-read, fair-spoken).
| 1594 Shakes. Lucr. 3 Lust-breathed Tarquin. 1607 ― Timon i. i. 10 A most incomparable man, breath'd as it were, To an vntyreable and continuate goodness. 1647 Ward Simp. Cobler 14 It is a most toylsome taske to runne the wild-goose chase after a well breath'd Opinionist. 1681 Dryden Abs. & Achit. 631 To speak the rest, who better are forgot, Would tire a well breath'd Witness of the Plot. |
2. Put out of breath, exhausted, winded.
| 1599 Porter Angry Wom. Abingd. in Hazl. Dodsley VII. 358 As good as a cry of hounds, to make a breath'd hare of me! |
3. Exhaled, respired, inhaled and exhaled; uttered in a breath, whispered.
| 1579 Spenser Sheph. Cal. Jan. 40 The blossome..With breathed sighes is blowne away, and blasted. 1596 ― F.Q. ii. iii. 7 Vile Caytiue..Vnworthie of the commune breathed aire. 1629 Milton Ode Nativity 179 No nightly trance, or breathed spell, Inspires the pale-eyed priest. 1861 Smiles Engineers II. 220 The exhausted or breathed air. |
4. Of wind-instruments: Played upon; cf. breathe v. 15. poet.
| 1822 Proctor (B. Cornwall) Lud. Sforza i. 16 Like numbers floating from the breathed flute. |
† 5. breathed ware: ? tarnished goods; ‘braided ware’.
| 1661 Davenport City Nt.-Cap iv. in Dodsley (1780) XI. 326 We vent no breath'd ware here. |
II. From the n. (brɛθt).
6. Having breath; as in long-breathed: long-winded, or long-lived. (The two early quots. are doubtful.)
| 1555 Fardle Facions ii. xi. 260 Damoselles..softe as the Silke, and breathed like the Rose. 1628 Earle Microcosm. xviii. 38 The rooms are ill breath'd. 1649 Selden Laws Eng. i. lxiv. (1739) 132 Had the King been a little longer breathed with patience, he might have had his will upon easier terms. 1816 Scott Antiq. xxi, ‘They werena a lang breathed generation, I reckon’. 1884 Mind Jan. 125 It requires a long-breathed reader to accompany him through his devious course. |
7. Phonology. Uttered with breath as opposed to voice; surd; cf. sonant.
| 1877 Sweet Handbk. Phonetics 31 Consonants can therefore be breathed as well as voiced. |