| 释义 |
fecundity|fɪˈkʌndɪtɪ|
[ad. L. fēcunditāt-em fruitfulness, f. fēcundus: see fecund and -ity. Cf. F. fécondité.]
1. Of female animals: The faculty of reproduction, the capacity for bringing forth young; productiveness.
In recent use distinguished from fertility, esp. in demographic use.
1447O. Bokenham Seyntys (Roxb.) 50 Whan thou..hast fecundyte Than schul they yiftes acceptable be. 1607Topsell Four-f. Beasts (1673) 217 The fœcundity of the beast that beareth them. 1727Bradley Fam. Dict. s.v. Bee, His Fecundity is such almost throughout the Year, that [etc.]. 1775Johnson Tax. no Tyr. 7 They multiply with the fecundity of their own rattlesnakes. 1856Grindon Life ix. (1875) 112 The most astonishing examples of fecundity occur among fishes and insects. 1866J. M. Duncan Fecundity 3 By fertility or productiveness I mean the amount of births as distinguished from the capability to bear... By fecundity I mean the demonstrated capability to bear children; it implies the conditions necessary for conception in the women of whom its variations are predicated... In short, fertility implies fecundity, and also introduces the idea of number of progeny; while fecundity simply indicates the quality without any superadded notion of quantity. 1904[see fecund a. 1 a]. 1922A. M. Carr-Saunders Pop. Problem ii. 51 Fecundity is measured by the number of ripe ova produced. 1936Discovery Sept. 297/2 The ratio of fertility (actual production of children) to fecundity (child-bearing capacity). 1964Gould & Kolb Dict. Soc. Sci. 265/2 Fertility in modern demographic usage relates to the actual frequency of births and carries no overtones of ability to have children. For the latter concept fecundity or reproductive capacity are now used.
2. Bot. The faculty or power of germinating.
1691Ray Creation (1714) 300 Some seeds that retain their Fecundity forty Years. 1884Syd. Soc. Lex., Fecundity..in Botany, the capacity of a seed for germination.
3. Of the earth: The quality of producing abundantly; fertility.
c1420Pallad. on Husb. i. 57 Ffecunditee thowe see thus in this lande. 1432–50tr. Higden (Rolls) I. 320 The..fecundite or plentuosenes of the soyle. 1548Hall Chron. Hen. VII an. 12. 41 a, The Cornyshe men inhabityng the least parte of the realme..and without all fecunditee, compleyned and grudged greatly. 1622T. Scott Belg. Pismire 2 The Earth..prevented thy desires with overflowing fecunditie. 1718J. Chamberlayne Relig. Philos. (1730) II. xx. §7 It [the Earth] has never failed, nor entirely lost its Foecundity. 1843Prescott Mexico iv. vii. (1864) 251 The marvellous fecundity of the soil.
4. Productiveness in general, the faculty or power of being fruitful, fertility:
a. of material things.
1555Eden Decades 266 It noryssheth the fecunditie of thynges generate. 1662J. Davies tr. Mandelslo's Trav. 137 This fecundity lasts all night, till the returne of the Sunne makes both the flowers and leaves drop off. 1721Bradley Wks. Nature 102 That Fecundity, which..antient Physicians..attributed to a Sympathy, or Love among Trees. 1796H. Hunter tr. St. Pierre's Stud. Nat. (1799) I. 573 It is not the heat of the Tropics which gives to this tree a fecundity so constant, and so varied. 1836Macgillivray tr. Humboldt's Trav. xiv. 181 A few drops of a vegetable fluid impress us with an idea of the..fecundity of nature. 1855Milman Lat. Chr. (1864) II. iii. vi. 93 The monks seemed to multiply with greater fecundity than the population of the most flourishing cities.
b. of immaterial things.
1621Donne Serm. xliii. 427 The Fecundity of the words. 1691Ray Creation (1714) 18 A demonstrative Proof of the..feccundity of His Wisdom and Power. 1789Bentham Princ. Legisl. xii. §17 The mischief..is..in point of fecundity pregnant to a degree that baffles calculation. 1824W. Irving T. Trav. II. 54 The extreme fecundity of the press. 1842H. Rogers Ess. I. i. 10 That fecundity of fancy, which can adorn whatever it touches.
5. The capacity for making fruitful or productive, fertilizing power.
1642H. More Immortal. of Souls iii. iii. 169 The fixed sunne..through his fecundity Peoples the world. 1680Morden Geog. Rect. (1685) 443 The River Nilus is famous for its Greatness and Fœcundity. 1860Pusey Min. Proph. 144 The ancients thought that the waters of the Nile must have some power of fecundity. 1868Peard Water-Farm. xii. 120 The fecundity of ‘the springs’. |