Aerial

a.; also 7 aereal. [f. L. āeri-us or āere-us airy (f. āer air) + -AL 1. As L. had two forms of the adj., āerius a. Gr. ἀέριος, and āereus after L. anal. as in aureus, ferreus, etc., so the early spelling in Eng. varied between aereal and aerial; the latter is alone used now. Cf. aereous and aerious, ethereal and etherial.] Airy or of air.

  I.  Of air as a substance.

  1.  Consisting or composed of air; aeriform, gaseous. Aerial acid: obs. name of carbonic acid gas, as being the only aeriform or gaseous acid.

1664.  Power, Exp. Philos., II. 118. The aërial particles may be in a new motion.

1772.  Priestley, Air, in Phil. Trans., LXII. 153. It is not improbable but that fixed air itself may be of the nature of an acid…. Mr. Bergman of Upsal … calls it the aërial acid.

  2.  Thin or attenuated as air, etherial; unsubstantial, intangible, shadowy; hence, immaterial, ideal, imaginary. Aerial architecture: building castles in the air.

1610.  Healey, St. Aug., City of God, 349. Those creatures … being reasonable, passive, aereall and immortall.

1651.  Hobbes, Leviathan, I. xii. 53. The Latines … thought them Spirits, that is, thin aëreall bodies.

1714.  Mandeville, Fable of Bees (1725), I. 40. The breath of man, the aerial coin of praise.

1829.  Scott, Demonol., x. 388. She was surprised to see a gleamy figure, as of some aerial being.

1838.  Dickens, Nich. Nick., xxvii. (C. D. ed.), 213. With such triumphs of aërial architecture did Mrs. Nickleby occupy the whole of the evening.

1855.  Milman, Lat. Chr., IV. vii. (1864), II. 344. The Church may draw fine and aërial distinctions.

  3.  Light as air, airy.

1606.  Bryskett, Civill Life, 54. For that tender age is rather sanguine and aeriall.

1756.  Burke, Subl. & B., Wks. 1842, I. 24. This delicate and aërial faculty, which seems too volatile to endure even the chains of a definition.

a. 1802.  W. L. Bowles, Poems, I. 149. Aërial Claude shall paint The gray fane peering o’er the summer woods.

  II.  Of the mass of air or atmosphere.

  4.  Of, pertaining to, or produced in the air or atmosphere; atmospheric.

1604.  Shaks., Oth., II. i. 39. Euen till we make the Maine, and th’ Eriall blew, An indistinct regard.

1697.  Dryden, Virgil Georgics, IV. 1 (J.).

1819.  Shelley, Prometh. Unb., II. v. 13. As the aërial hue Of fountain-gazing roses.

1860.  Maury, Phys. Geog. Sea, xv. § 677. 370. On the edges of this remarkable aerial current the wind is variable.

1870.  Tyndall, Heat, vi. § 206. 164. We live at the bottom of an aerial ocean.

  Aerial Perspective.

1731.  Bailey, vol. II., Aerial Perspective is that which represents bodies weakened and diminished in proportion to their distance from the eye.

1851.  Ruskin, Mod. Painters, I. II. II. i. § 3. Aërial perspective is the expression of space by any means whatsoever, sharpness of edge, vividness of colour, &c.

  5.  Existing or moving in the atmosphere, above the earth, flying or floating in the air.

1621.  Burton, Anat. Mel., I. ii. I. ii. (1676), 28/1. Aeriall Spirits or Devils are such as keep quarter most part in the air.

1704.  Pope, Pastorals, Spring, 16. While she [the Nightingale] sings … All th’ aerial audience clap their wings.

1836–7.  Dickens, Sketches (1850), 78/2. Then the balloons went up, and the aërial travellers stood up.

1859.  Darwin, Orig. Spec., vi. (1873), 142. Petrels are the most aërial and oceanic of birds.

  6.  Placed aloft, or at an airy height, lofty, elevated; also fig.

1620.  Choyce Drollery, in Shaks. Cent. Praise, 134. Cloud-grapling Chapman, whose Aerial minde Soares at Philosophy, and strikes it blinde.

1733.  Pope, Ess. Man, III. 183. Here subterranean works and cities see, There towns aerial on the waving tree.

1847.  Lewes, Hist. Philos. (1867), II. 97. Rising into the aerial altitudes of imagination.

  7.  Growing, or existing, in the air or above ground, instead of, a. underground, b. under water.

1620.  Reliq. Wotton. (1672), 11. Cypresses, Cedars, and such other Aereal aspiring plants.

1842.  Gray, Struct. Bot., iii. § 1 (1880), 34. Aerial Roots for climbing are familiar in the Ivy.

1833.  Penny Cycl., XXVI. 424/1. Such openings, when occurring on land, constitute subaërial volcanoes.