statary, a.
(ˈsteɪtərɪ)
Also 7 erron. statory.
[ad. L. statāri-us, f. stat- ppl. stem of stāre to stand.]
† 1. Standing fast or firm, established; stated, fixed; having a fixed position, stationary. Obs.
| 1581 Mulcaster Positions xxxix. 199 Both a gentleman, and a common man..may be either rich or poore: landed or vnlanded, which is either the hauing or wanting of the most statarie substance. 1617 Collins Def. Bp. Ely i. i. 47 What is this to the Popedome? what to a Monarchie? what, I say not to their stately, but euen statarie and ordinarie supremacie in the Church? 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. v. xxi. 266 The set and statary times of payring of nailes, and cutting of haire. Ibid. vi. ii. 287 The observation of festivities and statary solemnities. 1650 Fuller Pisgah v. xxi. 184, I will not plead that a tent is also termed an house..that statory, or long standing tents were quilted with timber. |
† 2. Of soldiers: Equipped for stationary combat as opposed to skirmishing. Obs.
| 1623 Bingham Xenophon, Compar. Lipsius, The Battalions haue their spaces and intervals, and the Velites in them or before them. So that the Statarie Souldier serueth the Velites for retreat. |
3. Ent. Pertaining to or designating army ants during that phase of their life cycle when they return to a fixed colony each night.
| 1933 Jrnl. Compar. & Physiol. Psychol. XV. 297 When in the ‘statary’ condition, [ant] colonies do not appear as susceptible to the atmospheric changes that apparently furnish the stimuli for the bivouac-change movements of nomad colonies. 1940 Jrnl. Compar. Psychol. XXIX. 434 Swarm division is exceptional in a statary colony, but is a regular morning event in a nomadic colony. Ibid. 435 Smaller swarms..characterize the statary period. 1972 Sci. Amer. Nov. 73/3 The actual regulator of the ants' nomadic and statary behavior, as Schneirla eventually demonstrated, was not some external influence but the breeding cycle within the colony. |