torrid, a.
(ˈtɒrɪd)
Also 7 erron. torred.
[ad. L. torrid-us, f. torrēre to dry with heat: see -id. Cf. F. torride (Rabelais 1546), Sp., Pg. tórrido, -a, It. torrido, -a.]
1. Scorched, burned, exposed to great heat; also, intensely hot, burning, scorching.
| 1611 Cotgr., Torride, torride, scorched, burned, parched; also,..dried by the extremitie of heat. 1613 Purchas Pilgrimage viii. i. 603 A torrid and scorched earth. 1658 J. Robinson Endoxa ix. 48 Exotick simples..corrupted by the long and torrid space of the Voyage. 1667 Milton P.L. xii. 634 Fierce as a Comet; which with torrid heat..Began to parch that temperate Clime. 1798 Canning in Anti-Jacobin No. 27. 146 All in the town of Tunis, In Africa the torrid. 1809 Byron Ch. Har. i. xxviii. note, Such torrid weather. 1876 Merivale Rom. Triumvirates vii. (1877) 146 The march through this torrid and trackless region occupied seven days. |
b. esp. in
torrid zone, the region of the earth between the tropics. (
Orig. in L. form,
torrida zona or
zona torrida;
cf. Virg. Georg. 1. 234.)
| [1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xi. iii. (Bodl. MS.), Þe cercle þat hatte Torrida zona [L. orig. a 1350] vnder þe whiche þe sonne meueþ alwei. 1553 Eden Treat. Newe Ind. (Arb.) 33 The burning lyne called Zona Torrida.] 1586 Marlowe 1st Pt. Tamburl. iv. iv, Thence by land unto the torrid zone. 1794 Sullivan View Nat. I. 156 Why, under the torrid zone, have the little islands a temperature always supportable..? 1834 M. Somerville Connex. Phys. Sc. xxvii. 272 In the valleys of the torrid zone, where the mean annual temperature is very high. |
c. transf. Inhabiting the torrid zone.
| 1771 Pennant Syn. Quadr. 297 Torrid jerboa. |
† d. Of colour: Burned, blackened with burning.
| 1634 Sir T. Herbert Trav. 24 Their colour is (answerable to the Zone they breathe in) blacke and Torrid. 1650 Charleton Paradoxes 18 It grows not black and torrid..by the affriction of the Saphire. |
2. fig. a. In reference to the ‘heat’ of persecution, or sometimes to the burning of heretics.
| a 1635 Corbet Poems (1807) 48 Had shee bin then In Maryes torrid dayes engend'red, when Cruelty was witty. 1702 C. Mather Magn. Chr. iii. i. iii. (1852) 316 The countries which the bloody Popish inquisition has made a clime too torrid for a Protestant. |
b. Hot in temper or passion; ardent, zealous, enthusiastic.
| 1646 Crashaw Steps to Temple 84 Temper'd 'twixt cold despair and torrid joy. 1685 in Maidment Bk. Scott. Pasquils (1868) 287 But I was ne'er in love so torrid As to miscarry with my mate. 1909 Nation 16 Oct. 129/2 Mr. Finck is about as torrid a hot gospeller as one could meet with. |
Hence
ˌtorridly adv.;
ˈtorridness.
| 1657 R. Ligon Barbadoes (1673) 9 Finding the Air so *torridly hot, I thought good to make tryal of the water. |
| 1638 Sir T. Herbert Trav. (ed. 2) 36 The [ayre] inflamed by the *torridnesse of the Zone. a 1656 Ussher Ann. vi. (1658) 271 Their horses being all spent..with the length and torridnesse of the way. |