lifeful

English

Alternative forms

• lyfull (obsolete)

Etymology 1

From life +‎ -ful.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈlaɪf.fʊl/, /ˈlaɪf.fl̩/
• Hyphenation: life‧ful

Adjective

lifeful (comparative more lifeful, superlative most lifeful)

1. Bestowing life; enlivening. [from 13th c.]
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book VI, Canto XI”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

     Her gentle hart […] Began some smacke of comfort new to tast, / Like lyfull heat to nummed senses brought […].

   • 1858, Edward Henry Nolan, The Illustrated History of the British Empire in India and the East:

     Christianity is operating among them in two ways; it exhibits its own glorious life amidst the decadence of antique idolatries, they grow old, and are stricken by the touch of ever-changing time, while Christianity puts forth the vitality and vigour of perennial youth; and while it is itself lifeful, and healthful as it is beautiful, it is gradually contributing to the decay of all the old superstitions that yet stand in ponderous and gloomy magnitude around it.

   • 1902, Report of Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the American Water Works Association, page 249:

     Hence, factually and mathematically, the cogeneracy, intimate relation and actual likeness existing between the earth's life-blood and man's clearly appear in proportions of about 95 to 5, since animal blood consists of about 95 per cent. water—a fact which, in turn, may prove water at least 95 per cent. more lifeful than human blood, which, excepting water, seems essentially to appear the most lifeful substance yet found — save and except, possibly, iron, which, though hitherto considered "dead," proves an enlivener of coursing blood, water, and hence animal life.

   • 1912, The Sewanee Review - Volume 20, page 219:

     Cheering the dogs to the chase across the "dew spread lawn," he would "drink deep cooling draughts of lifeful air," returning .with a keen zest to the joys of calm philosophy.

   • 1975, Geoffrey Grigson, The Gambit book of love poems, page 61:

     Set all your things in seemly good array Fit for so joyful day, The joyfulst day that ever sun did see, Fair Sun, shew forth thy favourable ray, And let thy lifeful heat not fervent be For fear of burning her sunshiny face, Her beauty to disgrace.

   • 2018, Praveen Kumar, Shobha Priya, page 309:

     Each vibration, a divine song In the furious exposition. The restless dance goes on and on Till finite force fills infinite horizon, Till the booming bang of the lifeful Om Reaches back its creative womb.

2. Full of vitality; lively and exuberant.
   • 1843, Charles Reece Pemberton, John Fowler (Secretary of the Sheffield Mechanics' Institution.), William Johnson Fox, The Life and Literary Remains of C. R. Pemberton:

     Instead of the olden spirit of enterprise, the city seemed to be the home of inertness—one grey and great temple of lassitude. Except the few money-getting American merchants who sojourned there, the only lifeful creatures to be met with are the myriads of insects that swarm in every house, as I found, to my great discomfort, on my second visit; not remaining sufficiently long on my first, to acquire a knowledge of their numbers and strength.

   • 1990, Jeanie Watson, Risking enchantment: Coleridge's symbolic world of faery, page 206:

     Like the "little child, a limber elf" in the Conclusion to Part II of "Christabel," this faery child quite bubbles over with "lifeful glee,"

   • 2015, Stephen C. Smith, Ending Global Poverty: A Guide to What Works:

     “Pupils who had been miserable now became active and lifeful,” she told me with obvious satisfaction.

3. Characteristic of life and living things.
   • 1940, Rutgers University. School of Education, Trends in the Teaching of Reading:

     Pupils are interested most in a variety of literary forms which consist of poetry and literature of a humorous and exciting nature, involving lifeful experiences.

   • 1943, Vera Lebedeff, The Heart Returneth, page 156:

     Her mouth was moist and tasted of tobacco, and he could feel her heart beat, lifeful and sure, under the small rounds of her breasts.

   • 1973, Lee Thayer, Communication: Ethical and Moral Issues, page 307:

     My view is that what we call feelings, things, sensations, values, moral directives, etc. are intimately linguistic but arc so only so far as they are humanly lifeful.

   • 2014, Jonathan Eig, The Birth of the Pill:

     I regard [it] rather as a fundamentally normal, clean, lifeful instinct.

Adverb

lifeful (comparative more lifeful, superlative most lifeful)

1. In a lifeful manner; full of life.
   • 1818, John Keats, Endymion, section I:

     A colour grew / Upon his cheek, while thus he lifeful spake.

   • 1848, James Anthony Froude, John Tulloch, Fraser's Magazine - Volume 38, page 73:

     Although the auburn and the black hackles are killing enough in the Highland glens and moorlands, and are good general flies, in some favourite places, where the warmer, richer streams flow lifeful from the glorious lake, above the wooded glen that opens on the fertile valley, the ' Professor,' with all his wily vagaries, is the only tempter that can allure, the only charmer that can charm.

   • 1995, Pritam Sen, Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, God's love in Upanishad philosophies, page 181:

     Million blossoms burst forth lifeful in their bright colours and perfumes.

Etymology 2

life +‎ -ful.

Noun

lifeful (plural lifefuls)

1. A quantity that fills a lifetime.
   • 1904, Joseph Samuel Exell, Isaiah, page 428:

     There seems to be an enormous waste of human goodness, while we have at the same time so little of it that we cannot afford, if we only knew our true interests, to lose a single lifeful.

   • 1921, The Photographic Journal: Publication of the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain and the Photographic Alliance, Volume 45:

     I have thus rapidly outlined what I think we may fairly describe as about two lifefuls of work, but there still remains a third.

   • 1959 August 6, Jean Sprain Wilson, “She’s 82 And Fighting For World She’ll Leave Behind”, in The Miami News, Miami, Fla., page 4D:

     Controversial issues are nothing new to this woman who has jammed two or three lives-ful of events in her 82 years.

   • 1980, Moving Out - Volumes 9-13, page 9:

     She gave so much to so many and now her life is gone -- and what did she ever get out out of it?--Nothing--just nothing. A lifeful of nothing.

   • 1989, Jane Masbridge, “Toward the Next Millennium: No More Than a Matter of Simple Equal Rights”, in The Utne Reader, numbers 34-36, page 48:

     These two specific guys don't deserve the rage a lifeful of such remarks, “ignored,” have engendered.

   • 2002, Blackie Sherrod, Blackie Sherrod at Large, page 163:

     The poor fellow had a lifeful of losses.