ready-wittedadj.

1576 T. Newton tr. L. Lemnie Touchstone of Complexions sig. W8 (table) Frenchmen..prompt and readie witted.

1591 G. Fletcher Of Russe Common Wealth xix. f.67 ^v They [sc. the Tartars] are very pregnant, and ready witted to deuise stratageams vpon the suddaine for their better aduantage.

1652 J. Wadsworth tr. P. de Sandoval Civil Wars Spain ii. xx. 68 Iohn de Padilla's fault was, that hee was young, not above thirtie years of age, and not verie readie witted either.

1694 tr. O. G. de Busbecq Four Epist. conc. Embassy into Turkey ii. 123 He procures a mean Fellow, but bold and ready-witted, to counterfeit himself to be Mustapha.

1720 D. Defoe Life Capt. Singleton 308 William documented two of our Men, one a Surgeon, as he himself was, and the other a ready-witted Fellow, an old Sailor.

1786 R. Burns Poems 218 O rough, rude ready-witted R******.

1821 W. Scott Kenilworth II. iv. 89 Varney was as bold-faced and ready-witted as he was cunning and unscrupulous.

1895 A. B. Paterson Man from Snowy River 24 Quiet and shy as the bush girls are, But ready-witted and plucky, too.

1922 J. Joyce Ulysses ii. xiii. [Nausicaa] 341 Ciss, always, readywitted, gave him in his mouth the teat of the suckingbottle and the young heathen was quickly appeased.

1965 Times 13 Nov. 13/3 Somehow the salt-encrusted hero and the ready-witted princess are much more real than all the generations of Corinthian pioneers or Roman matrons.

2002 Roanoke (Va.) Times (Nexis) 8 June b2 He was a ready-witted charmer.

1815 J. Black tr. A. W. Schlegel Course Lect. Dramatic Art I. vii. 250 We are merely entertained with the display of sharpness and ready wittedness which are requisite to carry on the deceit.

2004 R. H. McKinney in J. Kanaris & M. J. Doorley In Deference to Other viii. 150 Kuschel acknowledges the need for humor to relativize..all manmade perspectives that do not have the humility to admit their own limitations. And this is what satirical ready-wittedness achieves.