| 释义 |
▪ I. † ˈasper, ˈaspre, a. Obs.
[a. OF. aspre (mod. âpre):—L. asper rough, harsh.]
1. Rough, rugged.
1491Caxton Vitas Patr. (W. de W.) i. xxxiii. 28 a/1 The wayes were soo aspre..that..they that shoed with gode and stronge shoes were cutte and broken. 1538Starkey England 134 The passage..through rough and asper montaynys. 1681tr. Willis' Rem. Med. Wks., Asper artery, the wind-pipe.
2. Harsh to the senses, in sound or taste.
1626Bacon Sylva §173 All Base Notes, or very Treble Notes, give an Asper sound. 1639T. de Grey Compl. Horseman 174 The medicines..when once they begin to grow stale, become sharp and asper.
3. Harsh to the feelings; bitter, cruel, severe.
c1374Chaucer Troylus iv. 798 And in hire aspre pleynte, thus she seyde. 1483Caxton Gold. Leg. 122/2 Thise aspre tormentes and cruell doubte. 1578Oliver of Castille vi. (T.) What dure and aspre strokes I have seen them give.
4. Of persons: Harsh, severe, stern.
c1374Chaucer Boeth. ii. i. 32 Þou..makest fortune wroþe and aspere by þin inpacience. 1565J. Calfhill Answ. Treat. Cross (1846) 51, I am more aspre in my writing than..modesty requireth. 1630T. Westcote Devon. 44 His melancholie..asper nature, by which he centureth other men.
5. Hardy, warlike; mettled, fierce, savage.
c1374Chaucer Anel. & Arc. 23 The aspre folke of Cithe. 1475Caxton Jason 6 b, He fought none but..the most aspre. 1503Shepherd's Kal. (1656) xlii, Naturally a man is..avaricious as a dog, and aspre as the Hart.
▪ II. ‖ asper, n.1 Gr. Gram.|ˈæspə(r)|
[L. asper (sc. spīritus): see prec.]
The rough breathing; the sign (῾) placed above an initial vowel, or over ρ, equivalent in power to a Roman h; thus ὧς = hōs, ῥάβδος = rhabdos.
▪ III. asper, n.2 Hist.|ˈæspə(r)|
[a. Fr. aspre, or ad. It. aspero, ad. Byzantine Gr. ἄσπρον lit. ‘white-money,’ f. ἄσπρος, -ον white (said to be ad. L. asper rough: see Littré).]
A small silver Turkish coin, of which 120 were reckoned equal to the piastre; in later use only a ‘money of account.’
1589T. Sanders in Arber Eng. Garner II. 20 Five Aspers..which are but two-pence English. 1622Fletcher Sp. Curate iii. iii, One..That would run on men's errands for an asper. 1781Gibbon Decl. & F. III. lxviii. 733 His poverty was alleviated by a pension of 50,000 aspers. 1819Scott Ivanhoe xv. II. 269, ‘I relieve not with one asper those who beg for alms upon the highway.’ |