tenebrificous
English edit
Etymology edit
From tenebrific + -ous, ultimately from Latin tenebrae (“darkness”).
Adjective edit
tenebrificous (comparative more tenebrificous, superlative most tenebrificous)
- (obsolete) Synonym of tenebrific (“producing darkness”).
- 1681, Henry More, “A Confutation of Aſtrology” (chapter XVI), in Tetractys Anti-Astrologica, […] , London: Printed by J[ohn] M[artyn] for Walter Kettilby, […] , →OCLC, page 86:
- But to fancy any Stars efficiently and poſitively to cauſe cold, is as extravagant and ridiculous as that conceit of Paracelſus, that imagined that it was not the abſence of the Sun but certain Tenebrificous Stars that cauſed Night.
- 1714 August 29 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “WEDNESDAY, August 18, 1714”, in The Spectator, number 582; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume VI, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC, pages 326–327:
- I consider writers in the same view this sage astrologer does the heavenly bodies. Some of them are stars that scatter light as others do darkness. I could mention several authors who are tenebrificous stars of the first magnitude, and point out a knot of gentlemen, who have been dull in consort, and may be looked upon as a dark constellation.
- 1752 November 25, Samuel Johnson [et al.], “Number VI. SATURDAY, November 25, 1752.”, in The Adventurer, volume I, London: […] J[ohn] Payne, […], published 1753, →OCLC, page 34:
- I have a new theory of optics demonſtrating, that darkneſs is cauſed by certain tenebrificous rays oppugning, obtunding, ſheathing, and abſorbing the rays of light.