| 释义 |
hermit, n.|ˈhɜːmɪt|
Forms: α. 3 armite, 4–5 ermyt(e, 4–6 armyte, armet, 4–7 ermite, 7 ermit. β. 4–6 hermyte, 4–8 -mite, (5 -mett), 6– hermit. γ. 3–7 heremite, 4–5 -myt(e, 6 Sc. -meit, 6–7 -mit. See also eremite.
[ME. hermite, ermite, a. OF. (h)ermite, L. erēmīta (med.L. also herēmīta), ad. Gr. ἐρηµίτης, f. ἐρηµία desert. Beside the forms immed. from French, ME. had heremite after med.L.; mod.Eng. has also eremite, q.v.]
1. a. One who from religious motives has retired into solitary life; esp. one of the early Christian recluses. See eremite 1.
αc1205Lay. 18800 Sone þe armite [c 1275 heremite] com in. a1300Cursor M. 8135 (Gött.) An armyte [v.rr. heremite, ermyte] þar þai fand at hame In þat montayn, was halt and lame. c1300St. Brandan 610 The ermite that was so old aȝen hem com gon. c1440Promp. Parv. 141/2 Ermyte..heremita. 1535Stewart Cron. Scot. II. 704 Into that yle..Ane halie armet duelland war tha dais. 1621Burton Anat. Mel. i. ii. i. ii, S. Hierome in the life of Paul the Ermite tells a story. 1651Jer. Taylor Holy Dying i. §3 (1727) 21 To be spent in the cottage of a frugal person, or to feed an Ermit.
βa1300Cursor M. 17900 (Gött.) A man come þan widuten lite, Þat semed wele haue bene hermite [v. rr. eremite, eremyte, Ermyte]. 1362Langl. P. Pl. A. Prol. 3 In Habite of an Hermite [B. Heremite, C. Ermite] vn-holy of werkes. c1400Mandeville (Roxb.) vii. 24 A haly hermit mette..a beste forschapen. 1481Caxton Myrr. i. v. 22 The other gaf it [their tresour] away and..wente as hermytes. 1588Shakes. L.L.L. iv. iii. 242 A withered Hermite, fiuescore winters worne, Might shake off fiftie, looking in her eye. 1703Maundrell Journ. Jerus. (1732) 80 Hermits retiring hither for Penance and Mortification. 1847Emerson Repr. Men, Goethe Wks. I. 384 There is much to be said by the hermit or monk in defence of his life of thought and prayer.
γc1275Lay. 18804 Þan heremite he iseh come. c1375Sc. Leg. Saints, Magdalena 812 A preste..Þat fled þe warld as heremyt. 1497Bp. Alcock Mons Perfect. D iij b, An heremyte cam to saynt Anthony. 1500–20Dunbar Poems xxv. 9 O! ȝe heremeitis and hankersaidilis, That takis your pennance at your tablis. 1600J. Pory tr. Leo's Africa ii. 154 The rule of heremites, the professors..whereof inhabite woods and solitarie places.
b. transf. A person living in solitude.
1799Campbell Pleas. Hope ii. 38 The world was sad..And man, the hermit, sigh'd—till woman smiled. 1841Emerson Addr., Lit. Ethics Wks. (Bohn) II. 213 The poets who have lived in cities have been hermits still. 1849Robertson Serm. Ser. i. viii. (1866) 138 A solitary man who..led a hermit's life..for hermit..he was.
2. In senses immediately derived from 1.
a. In the formal designation of certain monastic orders: e.g. Hermits of St. Augustine: see eremite 2.
1577–87[see eremite]. 1706tr. Dupin's Eccl. Hist. 16th C. II. iv. xi. 449 The Augustinians produced one [new branch] that of the Hermites of St. Augustin.
b. A quasi-religious mendicant; a vagabond; in Gypsy slang, a highwayman.
1495Act 11 Hen. VII, c. 2 §3 Every vagabounde heremyte or begger able to labre. 1568Grafton Chron. II. 118 Peter Wakefielde..an Hermite, an idle gadder about, and a pratlyng marchant. 1840Longfellow Sp. Stud. iii. v, And you, by the pole with the hermit's head upon it.
†c. A beadsman. Also fig. Obs.
1588Shakes. Tit. A. iii. ii. 41 As perfect As begging Hermits in their holy prayers. 1605― Macb. i. vi. 20 For those [honours] of old, and the late Dignities, Heap'd vp to them, we rest your Ermites. 1688R. Holme Armoury iii. 190/2 Begging Heremits first began to propagate here in England.
3. Applied to various animals of solitary habits, as the hermit-crab, the hermit-bird; see 4 b. In Austral. and N.Z. spec. of a sheep; also hermit sheep.
1661Walton Angler i. (ed. 3) 33 There is a fish called a Hermit, that at a certain age gets into a dead fishes shell, and like a Hermite dwells there alone. 1677N. Cox Gentl. Recreat. iv. (ed. 2) 5. 1862 Wood Nat. Hist. II. 239 All the Hermits build a very curious and beautiful nest. Ibid. (1865) III. 603 If two Hermits be removed from their houses, and put into a rock pool..the combats which take place..are as fierce and determined as any. 1874A. Bathgate Colonial Experiences xv. 212 A sheep which has been badly tutued and recovers, loses its gregarious habits, and becomes what the shepherds call a ‘hermit’. 1917E. Glen Six Little N.Zers vii. 95 They brought in a ‘hermit’ sheep which lived by itself, and had been overlooked in the last muster. 1933L. G. D. Acland in Press (Christchurch, N.Z.) 28 Oct. 15/7 Hermit, a single sheep which for some reason takes to living by himself, away from the mob. 1966G. W. Turner Eng. Lang. Austral. & N.Z. viii. 165 Sheep that recovered [from eating tutu] sometimes became hermit sheep, losing their gregarious habits.
4. attrib. and Comb., as hermit-seat; hermit-fancied, hermit-haunted adjs.; hermit-like a. and adv., like a hermit.
c1500Melusine lvii. 336 He dide doo make many hermyte habytes. 1709Watts Horæ Lyr. ii. To Discontented, Sylvia..Flies to the woods; a hermit saint! 1727–46Thomson Summer 15 Come Inspiration! from thy hermit seat, By mortal seldom found. 1785Burns Vision i. xx, Near many a hermit-fancy'd cove. a1800Cowper Snail, Hermit-like, his life he leads. 1852Hawthorne Blithedale Rom. xxiv, Within which lurked the hermit-frog. 1878Prodigal Son iv. in Simpson Sch. Shaks. II. 109 Many other hermitlike fools.
b. In names of various animals of solitary habits: hermit-bird, (a) a humming-bird of genus Phaëthornis; (b) a South American Halcyonide bird of genus Monasa, a nun-bird; hermit-crab, † hermit-fish, hermit-lobster, a crab of the family Paguridæ which has the habit of taking up its abode in a cast-off molluscan shell for the sake of protecting its soft shell-less hinder parts; hermit-crow, a name of the chough; hermit-thrush, a migratory thrush, Turdus solitarius, common in most parts of North America, and celebrated for its song; hermit-warbler, the western warbler, Dendrœca occidentalis, of the Pacific slope of North America.
1837Swainson Nat. Hist. Birds 154 The *hermit birds..frequently rise up perpendicularly in the air, make a swoop, and return again to their former station.
1735Mortimer in Phil. Trans. XXXIX. 115 The *Hermit-Crabs are generally found in great Plenty under these Trees. 1863Wood Nat. Hist. III. 603 Like all its race, the Hermit-crab inhabits the shell of some mollusc.
1591Sylvester Du Bartas i. v. 401 The *Hermit-fish..that builds him a defence 'Gainst Weather's rigour and Warr's insolence.
1850Johnston Conchol. 81 The other tribe are the soldier or *hermit lobsters (Paguri).
1840Swainson Nat. Hist. Insects 106 *Hermit moths..extraordinary moths hitherto found only in New Holland.
1831― in Fauna Bor. Amer. II. 185 The food of the *Hermit Thrush consists chiefly of berries. 1884Roe Nat. Ser. Story vii, The chief musician of the American forests, the hermit-thrush.
Hence ˈhermit, ˈhermitize vbs. intr., to live as a hermit. ˈhermitism, ˈhermitry, the mode of life of a hermit.
1610G. Fletcher Christ's Tri. after Death xlvi, When with us hermiting in lowe degree, He wash't his flocks in Jordan's spotlesse tide. 1896Daily News 25 Apr. 5/1 ‘Hermitism’ is rule of life for the middle-aged in India. 1825Hone Every-day Bk. I. 286 He starved and hermitized at Hessleborough. 1844W. H. Maxwell Sports & Adv. Scotl. xii. (1855) 117 On this isolated..isle, the..Duke was left to hermitize. 1882H. C. Merivale Faucit of B. ii. vi, Hermitry must be such a bore if persevered in, the essence of life being variety. |