durance

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See also: Durance

English

Etymology

From Old French durance, from durer (“to last”).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈd͡ʒʊəɹəns/, /ˈdjʊəɹəns/

Noun

durance (countable and uncountable, plural durances)

  1. (archaic) Imprisonment; forced confinement.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto V”, in The Faerie Queene. , London: [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
      What bootes it him from death to be unbownd, / To be captived in endlesse duraunce / Of sorrow and despeyre without aleggeaunce!
    • 1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society, published 1973, page 373:
      the parson concurred, saying, the Lord forbid he should be instrumental in committing an innocent person to durance.
  2. (obsolete) Duration.
  3. (obsolete) Endurance, durability.
    • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, ”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies  (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, , page 49, column 2:
      Fal. Thou ſay'ſt true Lad: is not my Hoſteſſe of the Tauerne a moſt ſweet Wench? / Prin. As is the hony, my old Lad of the Caſtle: and is not a Buffe Ierkin a moſt ſweet robe of durance?
    • 1885–1887, Gerard Manley Hopkins, “”, in Robert Bridges, editor, Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins: Now First Published , London: Humphrey Milford, published 1918, →OCLC, stanza 2, page 63:
      O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall / Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap / May who ne’er hung there. Nor does long our small / Durance deal with that steep or deep.

Derived terms

Translations

References

Anagrams

Old French

Etymology

durer +‎ -ance.

Noun

durance oblique singular, f (oblique plural durances, nominative singular durance, nominative plural durances)

  1. duration (length with respect to time)
    • c. 1289, Jacques d'Amiens, L'art d'amours:
      Si prent on tost tele acointance
      Qui puet avoir peu de durance
      (please add an English translation of this quotation)
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