durance

See also: Durance

English

Etymology

From Old French durance, from durer (to last).

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈdjʊəɹəns/

Noun

durance (countable and uncountable, plural durances)

  1. (obsolete) Duration.
  2. (obsolete) Endurance.
    • 1885–1887, Gerard Manley Hopkins, “[Poem 41]”, in Robert Bridges, editor, Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins: Now First Published [], London: Humphrey Milford, published 1918, OCLC 5093462, stanza 2, page 63:
      O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall / Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap / May who ne’er hung there. Nor does long our small / Durance deal with that steep or deep.
  3. (archaic) Imprisonment; forced confinement.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.5:
      What bootes it him from death to be unbownd, / To be captived in endlesse duraunce / Of sorrow and despeyre without aleggeaunce!
    • 1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society 1973, p. 373:
      the parson concurred, saying, the Lord forbid he should be instrumental in committing an innocent person to durance.

Translations

Anagrams


Old French

Etymology

durer + -ance.

Noun

durance f (oblique plural durances, nominative singular durance, nominative plural durances)

  1. duration (length with respect to time)
    • circa 1289, Jacques d'Amiens, L'art d'amours
      Si prent on tost tele acointance
      Qui puet avoir peu de durance
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