[f. COMPACT v.1 + -ED1; or perh. formed, before the present tense was actually in use, as a more distinctly participial repr. of L. compactus: see COMPACT ppl. a.1] Firmly and closely joined or pressed together; knit together, compactly made up or composed; condensed, consolidated, compact.
1598. Yong, Diana, 192. Reading these ill compacted lines.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts (1673), 58. Well set and compacted legs.
1634. Sir T. Herbert, Trav., 113. The best compacted riches or pleasures, of these Asiaticall Empires.
1660. Boyle, New Exp. Phys. Mech., 344. The Pores of the compactedst and closest Bodies.
1794. Sullivan, View Nat., I. 252. Fire … in that condensed, compacted, fixed state has been deemed phlogiston.
1823. W. Buckland, Reliq. Diluv., 33. The horn of the rhinoceros, being a mass of compacted hair-like fibres.
1830. Carlyle, in Froude, Life (1882), II. 116. Resolute, compacted, girt for the fight.
1876. Bancroft, Hist. U.S., V. xxi. 576. Cowards who dared not stand before compacted Britons.
