| 释义 |
octave, n. (a.)|ˈɒktəv|
Also in sense 1 (pl.) 4 utaves, 4–6 utas, 5 oeptaves, optas, oeptas, 7 outas.
[a. F. octave (12th c. in Hatz.-Darm.), ad. L. octāva fem. of octāv-us eighth (sc. dies day), which superseded the pop. OF. oitieve (witieve, huitieve), sing. f., also huiteus, uyteaus, pl. masc. (perh.:—L. octālēs); semi-popular forms in OF. in sense 1 (pl.) were otaves, outaves, oectaves, octawes, AF. oeptaves, whence the early ME. forms in α.]
1. Eccl. (Formerly always in pl.: so med.L. octavæ, OF. huitieves.)
a. The eighth day after a festival (both days being counted, and so always falling on the same day of the week as the festival itself).
b. (In later use.) The period of eight days beginning with the day of a festival.
in the octaves answered to med.L. in octavis ‘on the eighth day’ of a festival.
α [1352Act 25 Edw. III (Stat. of Provisors), A les oeptaves (16th c. tr. utas) de la purificacion Nostre Dame.] 13..Trental of Gregory (Vernon MS.) 126 Let sei þeos Masses bi ȝoure hestes Wiþ-inne þe vtaues of þe ffestes. 1387Trevisa Higden (Rolls) VII. 259 In þe utas [v.rr. eotas, eoytaues] of Esterne. c1420Chron. Vilod. st. 766 Wtinne þe utaus of hurr' douȝter Seynt Ede. 1429Rolls of Parlt. IV. 342/2 Atte the oeptaves of Seynt Martyn in Wynter. 1463Bury Wills (Camden) 28 To contynwe sevene nyght aftir tyl the Vtas of my yeerday be passyd. 1472–3Rolls of Parlt. VI. 28/2 He appiered not..in the optas of saint John the Baptiste. 1493Festivall (W. de W. 1515) 49 b, For eche houre of the day..and euery daye of the utas. 1599Life Sir T. More in Wordsw. Eccl. Biog. (1853) II. 174 It is Saint Thomas's Eve, and the Utas of Saint Peter. 1610Holland Camden's Brit. ii. Ireland 166 A Parliament was held at Kilkenny in the Outas of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Ibid. 181 On the Monday after the Outas of Easter.
β1387Trevisa Higden (Rolls) VIII. 323 Þat ȝere in þe occabis [v.rr. octavas, eotaves, octaves, Higden in octavis Epiphaniæ] of þe twelfþe day was made a parlement at Londoun. 1432–50Ibid., In whiche yere a parliamente was kepede at London in the octaves of the Epiphany. 1483Caxton Gold. Leg. 436/2 Betwyxe the octaues of ester and penthecoste. 1563–87Foxe A. & M. (1596) 201/2 Driving off the time from the daie of Saint Martine to the octaues following. 1580Fulke Against Allen 356 (T.) Celestine granted from the feast,—and in the octaves, every day, thirty thousand years of pardon! 1688Dryden Brit. Rediv. 21 When his wondrous octaue roll'd again, He brought a royal infant in his train. 1739Whitefield in Life & Jrnls. (1756) 169 The Vicar takes care to observe the Octaves of Easter. 1818Cruise Digest (ed. 2) V. 394 A writ of entry was returnable on the octave of St. Michael, which was the 9th of October. 1883W. H. Rich-Jones Reg. S. Osmund (Rolls) I. 80 note, The festival of S. Silvester is on December 31, so that it is always within the octave of Christmas.
c. transf. A period of festivity.
1597Shakes. 2 Hen. IV, ii. iv. 22 Here will be old Vtis: it will be an excellent stratagem. 1602Cont. Liberal. & Prod. iii. iii. in Hazl. Dodsley VIII. 355 Let us begin the utas of our jollity.
2. A group of eight lines of verse; a stanza of eight lines (spec. = ottava rima); = octet 2.
a1586Sidney Arcadia (1622) 357 With monefull melodie it continued this octaue. 1604E. G[rimstone] D'Acosta's Hist. Indies vi. xxviii. 492 They have likewise put our compositions of musicke into their language, as Octaves, Songs, and Rondells. 1818Byron Let. to Murray 19 Sept., I have finished the First Canto (a long one, of about 180 octaves). 1881Athenæum No. 2811. 328/2 A group of sonnets..written in the regular form of octave and sestet.
3. Mus. (Formerly eighth, q.v. Sometimes abbrev. 8ve.)
a. The note eight diatonic degrees above (or below) a given note (both notes being counted), which is produced by vibrations of twice (or half) the rate; it forms the starting-point of a new scale of identical intervals but different pitch, and thus has the same name as the given note, and is treated in harmony as a replicate of it. Hence, by extension, any of the notes at successive intervals of eight degrees above or below a given note (second octave, third octave, etc.).
b. The interval between any note and its octave; an interval of eight (or strictly seven) degrees of the diatonic scale, comprising five tones and two diatonic semitones.
c. A series of notes, or keys of an instrument, extending through this interval.
d. The concord of a note and its octave; two notes an octave apart played or sung together.
consecutive octaves, hidden octaves: see these words. rule of the octave, a scheme, formerly in vogue, of harmonies for the successive notes of the scale. short octave, the lowest octave in some early organs, in which certain notes were omitted.
1656Blount Glossogr., Octave, an eighth in Musick. 1677Plot Oxfordsh. 299 One Hooper..could so close his lips, as to sing an octave at the same time. 1694Holder Harmony iv. (1731) 40 A Tenth ascending is an Octave above the Third... The Octave being but a Replication of the Unison, or given Note below it..it closeth and terminates the first perfect System, and the next Octave above it ascends by the same Intervals..and so on. 1749Power Pros. Numbers 21 The Octave..is the most perfect Concord. 1776Burney Hist. Mus. (1789) I. i. 3 The Greek scale in the time of Aristoxenus..extended to two octaves. 1840Penny Cycl. XVI. 396/2 Octave, the Rule of. Ibid. 491/2 A complete..organ should have three sets of keys, and at least two octaves of pedals. 1853Herschel Pop. Lect. Sci. vii. §97 (1873) 312 The ear..can discriminate tones only between certain limits, comprising about nine octaves. 1876J. Hiles Catech. Organ i. (1878) 5 Short Octaves only occur in very old Organs. 1887Browning Parleyings, C. Avison ii, Ere my hand could stretch an octave. 1889E. Prout Harmony ii. §33 The division of any string into halves, quarters, eighths, or sixteenths, gives the various upper octaves of the ‘generator’. Mod. Playing octaves with both hands.
e. An organ-stop sounding an octave higher than the ordinary pitch; more usually called principal (but sometimes distinguished as of a different quality of tone).
1716Specif. Organ St. Chad's, Shrewsbury in Grove Dict. Mus. II. 596 Great Organ..1. Open Diapason. 2. Stopped Diapason. 3. Principal. 4. Octave to middle C. 1880E. J. Hopkins ibid. II. 492 Octave, or Principal, an open metal cylindrical organ-stop, of four feet on the manual and eight feet on the pedal... In the Temple organ the two stops, of metal, are called ‘Octave’ and ‘Principal’ respectively; the former being scaled and voiced to go with the new open diapason, and the latter to produce the first over-tone to the old diapason.
f. transf. An interval analogous to the musical octave; e.g. the difference of vibration-period of rays of light or heat whose rates of vibration are as 1: 2.
1870Tyndall Notes on Light §254 While..the musical scale, or the range of the ear, is known to embrace nearly eleven octaves, the optical scale, or range of the eye, is comprised within a single octave. 1923Glazebrook Dict. Appl. Physics IV. 891/2 The continuous spectrum was thus extended to thirty-nine times the wave-length of sodium yellow, or five octaves into the infra-red. 1960[see infra-red a. and n. B]. 1961Berkner & Odishaw Sci. in Space i. 3 Even if we add the radio-frequency window to the narrow light-wave window, the sum gives astronomy about twenty octaves..of the electromagnetic spectrum with which to investigate the universe from the Earth.
4. a. A group or series of eight.
a1806K. White Rem. (1837) 406 Plato's syrens sing not only from the planetary octave. c1817Hogg Tales & Sk. II. 15 James and Elizabeth led the ring and the double octave that evening. 1868C. M. Yonge Pupils of St. John xv. 240 That Creation was due to an Ogdoad, or Octave of Principles. 1898Tit-Bits 9 Apr. 30/3 The..tallest brother of this remarkable octave stands 6 ft. 11½ in.
b. law of octaves (Chem.), the ‘periodic law’ as originally stated by its discoverer Newlands, according to which, the elements (excluding hydrogen) being arranged in order of their atomic weights, a recurrence of similar properties occurs (generally) at every eighth (or strictly seventh) term of the series.
1865J. A. R. Newlands in Chem. News 18 Aug. 83/2 This peculiar relationship I propose to provisionally term the ‘Law of Octaves’. 1887Athenæum 3 Sept. 299/3 Mr. Newlands..provisionally called his generalization the ‘Law of Octaves’... At length the Law of Octaves, modified and much amplified, emerged as the ‘Periodic Law’. 1932J. N. Friend Text-bk. Physical Chem. I. xvi. 330 According to Newlands' Law of Octaves, when the elements are arranged in the order of increasing atomic weights, the first and last of any eight consecutive elements possess similar properties. 1965D. Abbott Inorg. Chem. i. 31 In 1864 Newlands put forward his Law of Octaves, in which he likened the classification of elements to the musical scale.
†c. = octad 2 b. Obs.
†5. A Portuguese gold coin: the Dobre of 12,800 reis. Obs.
1747Gentl. Mag. 499/1 The Pernambuco fleet..arrived at Lisbon, Sept. 22, and brought..13,740 octaves of gold, and 439,980 crusades of silver. 1775Ann. Reg. 144 Arrived, at Lisbon, from the Brazils, a fleet with 1500 octaves of gold, 200,000 crusades of silver.
6. Fencing. (In full octave parade.) The position of parrying or attacking in the low outside line with the sword-hand in supination (if in pronation, it is seconde, q.v.).
1771Olivier Fencing Familiarized 25 The octave parade..is the opposition contrary to the half-circle [now called septime], and one of the most useful parades in fencing. 1784McArthur Fencing 12 Octave parade..is a lower outward parade. 1809Roland Fencing 45 By this method your foil must, for certain, arrive at his body, if he does not change to an octave, or any other parade. 1889W. H. Pollock, etc. Fencing 44 Octave, the same as seconde, but the hand in supination. Ibid. p. xi, Time Thrust in Octave.
7. A small wine-cask containing the eighth part of a pipe, or 13½ gallons.
1880in Webster Suppl. 1881Price List, Importing and delivering Sherries in Octaves.
8. attrib. (or as adj.) and Comb., as octave coupler, a device on an organ for connecting keys an octave apart (see coupler 2 a); octave flute, (a) a small flute sounding an octave higher than the ordinary flute, a piccolo; (b) a flute-stop on an organ sounding an octave higher than the ordinary pitch; octave key, a key on a wind-instrument used to produce a note an octave higher than the note that is being fingered; † octave rime = ottava rima; octave stanza, a stanza of eight lines, spec. = octave rime; octave stop = 3 e; octave-stretch, the stretch of the hand over an octave on a keyboard (in quot. fig.).
1880E. J. Hopkins in Grove Dict. Mus. II. 596 In 1726 John Harris and John Byfield, sen. erected a fine..organ for the church of St. Mary Redcliff, Bristol... The Redcliff organ..contained the first ‘*octave coupler’ that was ever made in England.
1798Arnot Let. in Kegan Paul Life Godwin I. 314 Pulled out my little *octave flute. 1852Seidel Organ 20 In 1590, the octave-flute was invented by Compenio.
1880Grove Dict. Mus. II. 487/1 In more modern instruments [sc. oboes] a second *octave-key has been introduced..which is usually lifted on reaching A above the stave. 1911Encycl. Brit. XXIV. 274/1 The first 15 semitones are obtained by opening successive keys, the rest of the compass by means of octave keys enabling the performer to sound the harmonic octave of the fundamental scale. 1957A. C. Baines Woodwind Instrum. iv. 106 With full automatic octave keys, the G{sharp} key, when pressed, holds down ring III.
1700Dryden Pref. Fables Wks. (Globe) 494 Boccace..is said to have invented the *octave rhyme, or stanza of eight lines.
1821Byron Lett. to Moore 1 Oct., A poem, in *octave stanzas. 1887Colvin Keats vii. 149 The octave stanza introduced in English by Wyatt and Sidney.
1880E. J. Hopkins in Grove Dict. Mus. II. 492 In foreign organs the *Octave stop sounds the first octave above the largest metal Register of Principal (Diapason) measure on the clavier.
a1861Mrs. Browning Little Mattie vi, The *octave-stretch..Of your larger wisdom!
Hence ˈoctave v., (a) to add strings, as in a harpsichord, giving notes severally an octave higher than the ordinary ones, so as to reinforce the tone; (b) to play in octaves (Cent. Dict. 1891).
1885A. J. Hipkins in Encycl. Brit. XIX. 74/1 Imitation of the harpsichord by ‘octaving’ was at this time [about 1772] an object with piano makers. |