short-lived, a.
(ʃɔːtlaɪvd; the stress is variable)
Also -lif'd.
[f. short a. + live, life + -ed2. Often apprehended as f. lived pa. pple. of live v. (cf. smooth-spoken) and pronounced (-lɪvd).]
1. Having a short life.
| 1588 Shakes. L.L.L. ii. i. 54 Such short liu'd wits do wither as they grow. c 1608 B. Jonson Hymenæi Wks. (1616) 911 So short-liu'd are the bodies of all things, in comparison of their soules. 1645 Quarles Sol. Recant. ii. 3 The short lif'd days of flesh and blood. 1707 Curios. Husb. & Gard. 336 The Plants indeed were short-liv'd, and continued no longer than the Heat of the Vessels lasted. 1842 Loudon Suburban Hort. 591 The peach being a short-lived tree. 1871 G. H. Napheys Prev. & Cure Dis. i. vi. 168 Gymnasts are short lived. 1875 E. White Life in Christ i. i. (1878) 13 The million species of organisms of which he [man] is the short-lived lord. |
2. a. transf. Lasting only a short time, brief, ephemeral.
| 1588 Shakes. L.L.L. iv. i. 15 O short liu'd pride. 1645 Waller Poems, To Amoret 60 Then smile on me, and I will prove Wonder is shorter liv'd then Love. 1711 Addison Spect. No. 256 ¶5 Admiration is a very short-liv'd Passion. 1848 Dickens Dombey liii, I was made a short-lived toy, and flung aside more cruelly and carelessly than even such things are. 1888 Burgon Lives 12 Gd. Men II. v. 18 He afforded a short-lived triumph to the enemies of Religion. |
b. Metallurgy.
| 1884 Lock Workshop Rec. Ser. iii. 22/1 Sulphur..makes molten iron ‘short-lived’. |
c. Of a radioisotope or sub-atomic particle: having a relatively short half-life.
| 1926 R. W. Lawson tr. Hevesy & Paneth's Man. Radioactivity xxiii. 170 Short-lived thorium isotopes like uranium X, radiothorium, etc. 1947 Radiology XLIX. 286/2 The tracer and therapeutic studies with ‘short-lived’ artificially produced radioactive isotopes were not directed toward the study of the more general biologic effects. 1973 L. J. Tassie Physics of Elem. Particles ix. 91 Since the weak interaction causing the decay of the neutral kaon does not conserve CP, the short-lived neutral kaon and the long-lived neutral kaon are not necessarily eigenstates of CP. |
Hence shortˈlivedness, brief duration.
| 1817 Bentham Parl. Reform Introd. 69 In proportion to the short-livedness of the power, diminishes, both to purchasers, and thence to sellers, the venal value of it. 1875 Stubbs Const. Hist. I. i. 6 The shortlivedness of their organisations. |