great 
3. Exceeding or unusual in degree: as, great 
fear, love, strength, wealth, power. 
Merlin be-hilde hir with grete anguyssh. 
Merlin (E. E. T. S.), iii. 807. 
As you [ Henry II. ] forsake God's Cause now, so he here- 
after will forsake you in your greatest Need. 
Baker, Chronicles, p. 58. 
Ammona, who lived with three thousand brethren in so 
great silence as if he were an anchoret. 
Jer. Taylor, Works (ed. 1836), I. 738. 
4. Widely extended in time; of long duration; 
long-continued; long: as, a great delay. 
Rising up a great while before day, he went out 
Mark i. 35. 
Their great guilt, 
Like poison given to work a great time after, 
Now "gins to bite the spirits. Shak., Tempest, iii. 3. 
5. Of large extent or scope ; stately; imposing; 
magnificent: as, a great entertainment. 
And l.i-vi made him a great feast In his own house. 
Luke v. 29. 
Trust me, In bliss I shall abide 
In this great mansion, that is built for me, 
So royal-rich and wide. Tennyson, Palace of Art. 
6. Of large consequence ; important ; momen- 
tous; weighty; impressive. 
Thus the! weren in 9 Dayes, fro that Cytee at Betheleem ; 
and that was gret Myracle. MartdevUle, Travels, p. 70. 
God's hand is great in this ; I do forgive him. 
/;". and !'/., Knight of Burning Pestle, iv. 3. 
The duke expects my lord and you, 
About some great affair, at two. 
Pope, Imit. of Horace, II. vL 74. 
Great offices will have 
Great talents. Cowper, Task, Iv. 788. 
She caught the white goose by the leg, 
A goose 'twas no great matter. 
Tennyson, The Goose. 
7. Chief; principal; largest or most important : 
as, the great seal of England; the great toe. 
[In this sense the word is used in many geographical 
names, and was formerly used as part of the titles of some 
Oriental sovereigns : as, Great Britain, so called originally 
to distinguish it from Brittany (Britannia Minor, Little 
Britain) in France; the Great Mogul (= the chief Mon- 
gol), one of the Mongolian emperors of Hindustan ; the 
Great Sophy, one of the Persian sovereigns of the Sufi 
dynasty.] 
In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood 
and cried. John vii. 37. 
When went there by an age, since the great flood, 
But it was fam'd with more than with one man ? 
Shot., J. C., i. 2. 
8. Holding an eminent or a superlative position 
in respect to rank, office, power, or mental or 
moral endowments or acquirements ; eminent ; 
distinguished; renowned: as, the great Crea- 
tor; a great genius, hero, or philosopher; a 
great impostor ; Peter the Great. 
Whanne these thingis weren herd, the! weren flllid with 
ire and crieden and seiden greet is the Dian of Effesians. 
Wycltf, Acts xix. 28. 
Thou slave, thou wretch, thou coward ; 
Thou little valiant, great in villainy! 
Shak., K. John, iii. 1. 
They do so all to bemadara me, I think they think me 
a very great lady. B. Jon#on, Bartholomew Fair, v. 3. 
It is only from a school that we can expect to have good 
writers ; it is almost invariably from a school that great 
writers, these lawless exceptions, issue. 
R. L. Stevenson, A College Magazine. 
9. Grand ; magnanimous ; munificent ; noble ; 
aspiring: as, a great soul. 
Think not, thou noble Roman, 
That ever Brutus will go bound to Rome ; 
He bears too great a mind. Shak., J. C., v. 1. 
When vanquished foes beneath us lie, 
How great it is to bid them die ! 
But how much grea'er to forgive, 
And bid a vanquished foe to live! 
Addison, Rosamond, ii. 6. 
Our hoard is little, but our hearts are great. 
Tennyson, Geraint (song). 
10. Expressive of haughtiness or pride ; arro- 
gant; big: as, great looks; great words. [Ob- 
solete or archaic.] 
When they speak great swelling words of vanity, they al- 
lure through the lusts of the flesh. 2 Pet. ii. 18. 
Can you rail now ? pray, put your fury up, sir, 
And speak great words ; you are a soldier ; thunder ! 
Fletcher, Rule a Wife, iv. 1. 
11. Filled; teeming; pregnant; gravid. 
Great with child 
Was this poor innocent. 
Beau, and Fl., Knight of Malta, v. 2. 
Great with hope, to sea they put again. 
Drayton, Polyolbion, i. 415. 
He had a sow, sir. She, 
With meditative grunts of much content, 
Lay great with pig, wallowing in sun and mud. 
Tennyson, Walking to the Mail. 
12. Hard; difficult. 
If the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, 
wouldst thou not have done it 1 how much rather then, 
when he saith to thee, Wash, and be clean ? 2 Ki. v. 13. 
2612 
It is no great matter to live lovingly with good-natured 
and meek persons. J?r. Taylor. 
13f. Widely known; notorious. 
The fact is great. Tourneur, Revenger's Tragedy. 
14. Much in action; active; persistent; oar- 
nest; zealous: as, a great friend to the poor; 
a great foe to monopoly. 
Your company to the Capitol, where, I know, 
Our greatest friends attend us. Shak., Cor., i. 1. 
For, besides that he's a fool, he's a great quarreller. 
Shak., T. N., i. 8. 
15. Much in use; much used; much affected; 
much favored; favorite; familiar. 
Moses was great with God. 
Bp. Hall, Contemplations, vii. 1. 
"He does not top his part," . . . a great word with Mr. 
Edward Howard. 
Buckingham, The Rehearsal, Key (ed. Arber, p. 70). 
You are very great with him ; I wonder he never told 
you his Grievances. Congreve, Double-Dealer, iii. 5. 
The ladies arm-in-arm in clusters. 
As great an' gracious a' as sisters. 
Burns, The Twa Dogs, 1. 217. 
16. In geneal., one degree more remote in as- 
cent or descent : generally joined with its noun 
by a hyphen, and used alone only for brothers 
and sisters of lineal ancestors, in other cases 
before the prefix grand-: as, great-uucle, great- 
aunt (brotheror sisterof a grandparent) ; grcat- 
grandfather, r/reat-grandson, i/j-eai-grandneph- 
ew. For remoter degrees it is repeated : as, great-great- 
grandmother, prea(-0Tea(-grandchildren, great-great- 
<jrea(-uncle, etc. 
The same, his ancient personage to deck, 
Her r/real-rreat-grandsire wore about his neck. 
Pope, R. of the L., v. 90. 
17. In music, in the comparative, same as 
major: as, greater third (a major third), etc. 
A great deal See dealt, 2. A great gross. See grots. 
Full great. See full. Great auk. See o*i and 
Alca. Great Basin. See basin, B. Great Bear. See 
bears, 3. Great braguette, buck, Carolina wren, 
casino. See the nouns. - Great Canon, in the Gr. Ch., 
the longest canon of odes (each ode in it containing about 
twenty tropariaX sung on the Thursday next after the 
fourth Sunday in Lent at lauds (npOpor), after the fifty- 
first psalm. It is said to have been composed by St. An- 
drew of Crete (who lived about A. D. 680X and is peniten- 
tial in character, the soul as speaker naming and bewail- 
ing its likeness to the chief sinners and its unlikeness to 
the great saints of the Old Testament. The day on which 
it is sung is called from it the Thursday of the Great Can- 
on. Great Charter. See Magna Charta, under ehar- 
ta. Great cheapt, circle, climacteric, commoner. 
See the nouns. - Great-circle sailing. See sailing. 
Great clam, a bivalve mollusk of thefamily Mactridee, 
Lutraria maxima, of the Pacific coast of North America. 
Great congregation. See congregation, 8. Great 
cry and, little wool. See cry. Great Eleusinia. See 
Efeufinia.- Great elixir. See elixir, 1. Greater cov- 
erts, in ornith. See covert, 6. Greater Dionysla, long- 
beak, shearwater, telltale, titmouse, etc. See the 
nouns. Greatest common measure. See measure. 
Great fast. Same as great Lent. See Lent.- Great 
fee. See/ee2. Great foot, greater foot, in anc. pros. : 
(a) A foot having the same number of times or syllables, 
or the same name, as an ordinary foot, but the times or 
syllables of which are of double the usual length. The 
great feet are : (1) three feet consisting of tetrasemic or 
double longs, namely, the double or great (greater) spon- 
dee ( f ' X t ne trochee semantus ( ), and 
the orthius (* z ); (2) the paeon epibatns (f- 
). (6) In a wider sense, a colon or series. Great 
generals. See general. Great go, gray owl, gross, 
gun, habit, horned owl, hundred, intercession, Lent, 
etc. See the nouns. Great Jack. Same as bombard, 4. 
Great master* [ = D. grootinerster, grand master (of an 
order, etc.)], a chamberlain. Davies. 
I was in commission with my Lord Great Master and the 
Earl of Southampton, for altering the Court of Augmen- 
tations. Gardiner, To Duke of Somerset (1547). 
Great northern diver, northern falcons, northern 
shrike. See the nouns. Great oblation, octave, or- 
gan, sixth Sunday, week, white egret, etc. See the 
nouns. Great schism, (a) The division between the 
Latin and Greek churches, begun in the ninth century 
and culminating in A. D. 1054. See Greek Church, under 
Greek, a. (6) The forty years' division, A. D. 1378-1417, 
between different parties in the Latin or Roman Catholic 
Church, which adhered to different popes. Great sea. 
(a) In the English Bible, the Mediterranean sea. 
And the west border [of Judah] was to the great sea, 
and the coast thereof. Josh. xv. 12. 
(6) The Black Sea In great force. See forcei. The 
great arcanum, awakening, Elector, Entrance. See 
the nouns. The Great Day of Expiation. See expia- 
tion. The great death. Same as the black death (which 
see, under death). The Great Forty Days, (a) The 
forty days during which Christ remained on earth after 
his resurrection and before his ascension, appearing to 
his disciples from time to time, and instructing them in 
matters pertaining to the kingdom of God (Acts i. S). (ft) 
The corresponding season of the church year, from Easter 
to Ascension. The Great Mogul. See J/of/irf, anddef.7. 
To be great fun. See fun. =Syn. 1 and '2. Great, Large, 
Big. Great is a very general word, as may be seen by the 
definitions; it covers extent, number, and degree. Large 
expresses greatness in at least two dimensions, and is not 
so free in secondary uses ; hence we speak of a large room, 
picture, or apple, but not of a large noise, trouble, or dis- 
tance. Big is sometimes essentially the same as great, but 
it often suggests bulkiness, weight, clumsiness, or less of 
greathead 
dignity than is implied in great or large : tut, & big boy ; a 
big ship. 
Nobody can be great, and do great things, without giv- 
ing up to death, so far as he regards his enjoyment of it, 
much that he would gladly enjoy. 
Hawthorne, Septimius Felton, p. 115. 
Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere. 
Gray, Elegy. 
Behemoth, biggest born of earth, upheaved 
His vastness. Milton, P. L., vii. 471. 
/;/'/ phrases and images are apt to be pressed into the 
service when great ones do not volunteer. 
L&well, Among my Books, 1st ser., p. 34. 
II. H. It. The whole; the gross; the mass; 
wholesale: as, to work by the great. 
To let out thy harvest, by great, or by day, 
Let this by experience lead thee the way : 
By great will deceive thee, with liug'ring it out. 
By day will dispatch and put all out of doubt. 
Tusser, Husbandry, August. 
Gentlemen, I am sure you have heard of a ridiculous 
asse, that manic yeares since sold lyes by the great. 
Nashe, Pierce Fenilesse. 
2f. A great part; the greater part; the sum 
and substance. 
Of his sentence I wil yow seyn the grete. 
Chaucer, Parliament of Fowls, 1. 36. 
3. pi. The great go at Cambridge. See go, n., 3. 
Greats, so far as the name existed in my time, meant 
the Public Examination, as distinguished from Respon- 
sions, Little-go, or Smalls. 
E. A. Freeman, Contemporary Rev., LI. 821. 
greatt, v. [< ME. greten, greeten, < AS. grni- 
tian, become great (= MIX}, groten, make great, 
= OHG. ijrozen, MHO. grozen, grow great), < 
great, great: see great, a.} I, intrans. 1. To 
become great or large ; grow large ; enlarge. 
The erth it clang for drught and hete, 
And sua bigan the derth to grete. 
Cursor Mundi, 1. 4699. 
So that thai [oranges] forto greet 
In magnitude, and brynge in pomes greet. 
Palladium, Husbondrie (E. E. T. S.X p. 120. 
2. To become great with child; become preg- 
nant. 
The qnene greteth with quyk bon 
By the false god Ammon. 
Alitaunder (ed. Skeat, E. E. T. S.X 1. 464. 
H. trans. To make great ; aggrandize. 
base ambition ! This false politick, 
Plotting to great himself, our deaths doth seek. 
Sylvester, tr. of Du Bartas's Weeks, ii., The Lawe. 
great-aunt (grat'ant), . The sister of a grand- 
father or grandmother. In Great Britain gen- 
erally yrundaunt. 
great-bornt (grat'born), a. Nobly descended. 
Drayton. 
greatcoat (grat'kot), . An overcoat; a top- 
coat. [Eng.] 
Tom . . . prattled away while he worked himself into 
his shoes and his great-coat, well warmed through ; a 
Petersham coat with velvet collar, made tight after the 
abominable fashion of those days. 
T. Hughes, Tom Brown at Rugby, i. 4. 
greaten (gra'tn), v. [< ME. gretnen, intr., be- 
come great (pregnant).] I. intrans. 1. To be- 
come great or large ; increase ; dilate. 
Being committed against an infinite majesty, it [sin] 
ffreatens, and rises to the height of an infinite demerit. 
South, Sermons, X. 336. 
Life greatens in these later years, 
The century's aloe flowers to-day ! 
Whittter, Snow-Bound. 
2f. To become great with child ; become preg- 
nant. 
And sone aftur that gretnede that greithli mayde. 
Joseph ofArimathie (E. E. T. S-X p. 4. 
II. trans. To make great; magnify; enlarge; 
increase. 
The City was on flre, nobody knowing which way to 
turn themselves, while every thing concurred to greaten 
the fire. Pepys, Diary, HI. 155. 
Even the best things, and most worthy of our esteem, 
do not always employ and detain our thoughts, in propor- 
tion to their real value, unless they be set off and great- 
ened by some outward circumstances. 
Bp. Atterbury, Sermons, II. xxi. 
The grace of Christ in the spirit enlightens and enlivens 
the spirit, purifies and preserves the spirit, greatens and 
guides the spirit. if. Henry, Philip Henry, ix. 
great-eyed (grat'Id), a. Having large or prom- 
inent eyes, fitted for seeing in the dark : as, the 
gren t-eyed lemurs. Cones. 
great-fruited (grat'fro'ted), a. Bearing large 
fruit. 
The European great-fruited varieties [of the gooseberry]. 
Science, XII. -209. 
great-go (grat'go' ), n. See great go, under go, n. 
greathead (grat'hed), n. The American gold- 
eneye or whistlewing, Clangvlaqlaucion, a duck. 
J. P. Giraud, 1844; G. Trumbiih, 1888. [Long 
Island, U. S.j 
