▪ I. seething, vbl. n.
(ˈsiːðɪŋ)
[f. seethe v. + -ing1.]
The action of seethe v.
1. The state of being boiling hot.
| c 1300 St. Margarete 31 He let hete water oð seoþinge & þo hit boillede faste, He let nyme þis holi maide & þer amidde hire caste. |
b. transf. and fig. Ebullition, intense inward agitation. Also with up.
| 1593 Nashe Christ's T. O 2, This Vaine-glory..is (as I may call it) the froth and seathing vp of Ambition. 1851 Longfellow Gold. Leg. iv. Convent Cellar, But within, what a spirit of deep unrest! What a seething and simmering in his breast! 1873 Black Pr. Thule xxiii. 388 Nothing was visible but a wild boiling and seething of clouds and waves. |
† 2. The action or an act of keeping a liquid boiling hot, of cooking in boiling water, or of submitting anything to the action of boiling liquid.
| 1387 Trevisa Higden (Rolls) IV. 439 Biggynge and sellynge cesede, and so dede rostynge and seþinge [MS. γ seoþyng] and greyþinge of mete. 1398 ― Barth. De P.R. vi. xxi. (1495) 210 Salte is made by grete sethynge of water. 1585 T. Washington tr. Nicholay's Voy. iii. xi. 91 The seething together of plummes..and other lyke fruits. 1622 Mabbe tr. Aleman's Guzman d' Alf. ii. 327 The better to secure the seething of the Pot. 1725 Bradley's Fam. Dict. s.v. Potage, When this Mixture has been season'd, let it have five or six Seethings in a Stew-pan. |
† b. concr. Something boiled or in process of boiling. Obs.
| 1382 Wyclif Gen. xxv. 30 Ȝif to me of this brown sething [Vulg. Da mihi de coctione hac rufa]. c 1400 tr. Secreta Secret., Gov. Lordsh. lxviii. 85 Sethe hem softly to þe half, and after lat þe sethinge be steryd and strenyd. |
† c. Comb., as seething-house, seething-pot. Obs.
| 1459–60 Durham Acc. Rolls (Surtees) 89 In coquina sunt, viz. in le *sethynghowse, ij magne olle in furnis. |
| c 1500 Lacy Wyl Bucke's Test. a iij b, Then caste all togeter in a faire *sething-pott with water. 1668 Culpeper & Cole Barthol. Anat. i. ix. 18 So we cover it as we do our seething-pots with a potlid, to keep in the fumes. |
† 3. Digestion. Obs.
| 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. v. xl. (Bodl. MS.), Þe galle by heete þereof helpeþ þe seeþing of mete and drinke. 1628 Burton Anat. Mel. i. i. ii. v. (ed. 3) 20 Elixation is the seething [edd. 1, 2 boyling] of meat in the stomacke. |
▪ II. seething, ppl. a.
(ˈsiːðɪŋ)
[f. seethe v. + -ing2.]
1. Originally, of liquids, a cauldron, etc.: Boiling. In mod. use, a somewhat rhetorical expression for: Intensely heated (said of solids, the atmosphere, etc., as well as of liquids).
| a 1300 Leg. Rood 60 A caudron he let fulle Wiþ seþing oile vol Inouȝ. 1481 Caxton Reynard xlii. (Arb.) 114 [They] were aferd of that syedyng water. 1535 Coverdale Jer. i. 13, I do se a seethinge pot. 1662 J. Davies tr. Olearius' Voy. Ambass. 413 There is a Spring of seething Water, which falls into a Pool. 1825 Macaulay Ess., Milton ¶36 The hooks and the seething pitch of Barbariccia and Draghignazzo. 1848 Lytton Harold v. iii, But did he try the ordeals of God?..did his hand grasp the seething iron? |
b. quasi-adv., esp. in phrase seething hot.
| 1489 Caxton Faytes of A. ii. xxxvii. 155 Yf..the watre might be sedinge hote. a 1635 Corbet Poems (1807) 138 That 'tis so seething hott in Spaine, they sweare They never heard of a raw oyster there. 1870 Tyndall Fragm. Sci. (1879) I. vi. 197 The whole surface of which [the sea] was seething white. |
2. transf. and fig. Of waves, etc.: Ebullient, tumultuous. Also, pervaded by intense and ceaseless inner agitation: often with reference (lit. and fig.) to the condition characteristic of corruption or putrefaction.
| 1588 Marlowe 2nd Pt. Tamburl. iv. i. 3818 Whose scalding drops wil pierce thy seething braines. 1590 Shakes. Mids. N. v. i. 4 Louers and mad men haue such seething braines [etc.]. 1868 J. H. Blunt Ref. Ch. Eng. I. 433 The seething spirit of controversy. 1868 G. Duff Pol. Surv. 73 [He] plunged into the seething gulf of insurrection which was raging in Eastern Turkestan. 1871 R. Ellis Catullus lxiv. 156 Seething sand [L. Syrtis]. 1877 L. Morris Epic Hades i. 37 One white sea Of churning, seething foam. 1875 S. Haden Earth to Earth 66 To avoid the seething suburban cemeteries and to bury their dead at Woking. 1879 Farrar St. Paul (1883) 238 Amid this seething corruption. |
Hence ˈseethingly adv.
| 1887 Temple Bar Oct. 199 He explained to his seethingly angry friend. |