arcanity

From arcane +‎ -ity.

arcanity (countable and uncountable, plural arcanities)

1. (uncountable) The quality of being arcane.

   Synonyms: arcaneness, esotericism

   • 1894, Arthur Edward Waite, editor, The Hermetic and Alchemical Writings of Aureolus Philippus Theophrastus Bombast, of Hohenheim, Called Paracelsus the Great, volume I (Hermetic Chemistry), London: James Elliott and Co., page 271:

     Whatever physician has not this element of fire in its arcanity—if I may coin that word—cannot boast that he is a true and tried physician.

   • 1973, Ivor Brown, Words on the Level, The Bodley Head, →ISBN, page 21:

     Arcanity, if there is such a noun, is not a deliberate concealment.

   • 1974 October 14, Harry Themal, “N.Y. Film Festival blend creates mecca”, in The Morning News, volume 186, number 90, Wilmington, Del., page 16:

     Length, arcanity and just plain dullness of some of the festival fare of foreign films certainly provide some cerebral exercise for audiences.

   • 1975, CEA Critic, page 17:

     If thou’rt puzzled, go anywhere, / Seek priests or prophets, doctors for the brain, / I venture none of them can e’er explain / This love’s arcanity: like holy God / That’s three in one, ’t is more than something odd.

   • 1977, Dionysius, page 175:

     As moderns, we have a highly developed sense of the futility, even more, of the immorality of any effort to rehabilitate the pre-Enlightenment outlook. We cannot but reject at heart its capricous mysticism, its violence, its arcanity. Our sympathy with science is thus well-founded in a belief in our humanity and it is this which discourages us from embarking upon any serious revolt.

   • 1986, Paul F. Kress, “Social Critique”, in John S. Nelson, editor, Tradition, Interpretation, and Science: Political Theory in the American Academy, State University of New York Press, →ISBN, page 203:

     Here, purged of much of its arcanity and rendered in a native tradition of muckraking or investigative journalism, is the critique of Marcuse’s work in the 1960s.

   • 2000, Paul Fisher, “Career Authority and the Public in High Culture”, in Artful Itineraries: European Art and American Careers in High Culture, 1865–1920, London, New York, N.Y.: Routledge, published 2013, page 250:

     But this Greek word for a scientific instrument reverberates with education and arcanity.

   • 2001, Damian Chalmers, “The Positioning of EU Judicial Politics within the United Kingdom”, in Klaus H. Goetz, Simon Hix, editors, Europeanised Politics?: European Integration and National Political Systems, Frank Cass Publishers, →ISBN, page 188:

     By this it is meant that the activities of courts are less widely reported than those of legislatures and the general, universalist language of law assuages the ideological and practical implications of legal decisions, whilst its arcanity obfuscates what is at stake.

2. (countable) Something that is arcane.

   Synonyms: esoterica (plural); esoteric (noun)

   • 1890 February 15, The Brunonian, volume XXIII, number 12, Providence, R.I.: Brown University, page 166:

     On Wednesday evening, February 5, the Epsilon Pi secret society of ’93 had an initiation and spread in south University hall. Two candidates were admitted to the arcanities.

   • 1967, Practical Reflections on Figured Singing, Pro Musica Press, page 130:

     Let us look also at the works of Cavaliere Cristoforo Gluck, lately in the service of the Imperial Court, whose most penetrating vast genius and creative talent, is not only in possession of the most profound arcanities and recondite illuminations of philosophy and other sciences, but has developed a sense of the immensity thereof, from which rare, noble, interesting and sublime music was born, particularly French, of which he was the reformer, or, better, the autocrat.

   • 1973, Allan J. Cox, Confessions of a Corporate Headhunter, New York, N.Y.: Trident Press, →ISBN, pages 25–26:

     I do not shy from the essentially materialistic, often hypocritical aspects of the executive-headhunting profession, but I want to make clear that as much as we corporate consultants initiate circumlocutious arcanities and the simulacra of expertise rather than its substance, we are forced into so doing by a business ethic that often can swallow nothing less familiar: the truth, for instance.

   • 1974, Ralph W. Moss, Characterization in Petronius, Stanford University, page 109:

     Thirdly, his style should be filled with literary allusions and arcanities: 'refugiendum est ab omni verborum, ut ita dicam, vilitate et sunendae voces a plebe semotae, ut fiat "odi profanum vulgus et arceo"' (118.4).

   • 1974 November 8, Jeff Landaw, “Final Local Grid Picks: Panthers, Ramblers”, in Somerset Daily American, volume 46, number 111, page 13:

     Windber has a chance to tie Westmont for the Mountain Conference title with a victory, but because of the arcanities in the point system used to rate the schools, Westmont will win the title outright if Cambria Heights beats Northern Cambria tonight, even though neither of those teams is going anywhere.

   • 1977, New Age, page 77:

     She has wisely limited her treatment to the British Isles, which contain a sufficient variety of supernatural beings to satisfy the most compulsive collector of arcanities.

   • 1977, Worm Runner’s Digest, page 93:

     Reactionary disinhibited inhibition reallocates arcanities in unpopularistic ismism.

   • 1977, Commonweal, page 538:

     Dunne’s otherwise excellent effort suffers from occasional impenetrable arcanities and a minor habit of repetition of the same stories, […]

   • 1977 October 1, David Street, “Power Trips: Super-tractors with a lot of pull”, in The Canadian (The Gazette), page 14:

     A curious mix of rural and urban spectators gather near the pits and along the track discussing arcanities like weight-transfer, carburetion, super-chargers and fuel-injection.

   • 1979 April 24, “SALT II Debate Clue: Consider the Source”, in The Macon News, 95th year, number 114, Macon, Ga., page 8A:

     Both sides are lining up their experts. The experts mouth arcanities of throw-weights and numbers. They draw opposite conclusions from the same data.

   • 1997, David Ovason, The Secrets of Nostradamus: The Medieval Code of the Master Revealed in the Age of Computer Science, London: Century, →ISBN, pages 31, 77, and 353:

     However, it is not in Saint-Rémy that one is likely to find the true spirit of Nostradamus – in its concern for words, etymologies and arcanities – but in an area about a mile to the south of the town. […] The one thing which his day-to-day astrology had in common with his quatrains is the tendency for them both to involve prolixity, or arcanity, of expression. A fine example of this arcanity may be seen in the section of the letter to Rosenberger, quoted at the opening of this chapter. After reading this section, one cannot help concluding that Nostradamus was being self-indulgently obscurantist. […] How best may we summarize these complex analyses of sixteenth-century arcanities?

   • 2002, Tim Moore, “The (Other) Stations”, in Do Not Pass Go: From the Old Kent Road to Mayfair, London: Yellow Jersey Press, →ISBN, page 160:

     Marylebone’s previous role in my life had been restricted to humorously exploiting the tortured arcanities of its pronunciation when provincial relatives plopped their token there – a torment I would later have cause to regret while spending three university years in a city with a suburb called Penistone, and not finding out until the end of the third what I should have been saying to avoid the bus conductress’s slaps.

   • 2002, David Freedberg, “Lynxes”, in The Eye of the Lynx: Galileo, His Friends, and the Beginnings of Modern Natural History, Chicago, Ill., London: The University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, part I (Background), page 67:

     Early on they described themselves as “most sagacious investigators of the arcanities of nature and dedicated to the Paracelsan disciplines,” in an allusion to the influential Swiss doctor known as Paracelsus.

   • 2004, Kate Burns, “Mitchell Kapor: Free Expression on the Electronic Frontier”, in Fighters Against Censorship, Lucent Books, →ISBN, page 90:

     Other people might have formal titles, or governmental positions, have more experience with crime, or with the law, or with the arcanities of computer security or constitutional theory.

   • 2004 June 1, Data Integration: Strategic Directions (CIO/CSO advertising supplement), volume 6, number 2, page 5:

     Use an agreed-upon abstract language to translate the arcanities of their data, business logic, operating environments and even business processes.