ablow
Definition from Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Contents |
English [edit]
Pronunciation [edit]
Etymology 1 [edit]
Adjective [edit]
ablow (not comparable)
- (obsolete, postpositive) Blossoming, blooming, in blossom.
- 1867, Augusta Webster, “Lota”, in A Woman Sold and Other Poems,[1] Macmillan and Co., page 238:
- “ […] The flower breaks from its sheath and is ablow
- And gives its richest perfumes.” And I’d muse, […]
- 1891, Lizette Woodworth Reese, “Hallowmas” (poem), in A Handful of Lavender,[2] Houghton, Mifflin and Company, page 13:
- You know, the year's not always May —
- Oh, once the lilacs were ablow !
- 1989, Stephen L. Swynn, Garden Wisdom: Or, from One Generation to Another,[3] Ayer Publishing, ISBN 0836905024, page 110:
- […] against the green, yet, growing in tilled soil, grow stronger and taller than any daffodil can grow in turf : hundreds of them are ablow together, and the very robustness of their splendour […]
- 1867, Augusta Webster, “Lota”, in A Woman Sold and Other Poems,[1] Macmillan and Co., page 238:
- (dated, postpositive) Blowing or being blown; windy.
Usage notes [edit]
- Like most adjectives formed from this sense of a-, ablow never serves as an attributive premodifier; one can say “the flowers were ablow”, “ablow, the flowers […] ”, and even “ […] the flowers ablow […] ”, but not *“ […] the ablow flowers”.
Etymology 2 [edit]
a- + blow (“alteration of below”)
Preposition [edit]
ablow
- (Scotland) Below.
