Forms: 4 anguise, anguisse, 4–5 anguysch(e, angwische, angwishe, 6 anghysshe, 6– anguish. [a. OFr. anguissie-r, angoissie-r:—L. angustiā-re to straiten, distress, f. angustia: see prec.]
1. To distress with severe pain or grief, excruciate.
c. 1374. Chaucer, Boeth., III. viii. 80. Euery delit … anguisseþ hem wiþ prikkes þat vsen it.
1388. Wyclif, Gen. xxxi. 40. Y was angwischid in dai and nyȝt with heete and frost.
1560. J. Heywood, Seneca’s Thyestes, Argt. (1581), 21. Thiestes … knowing he had eaten his owne children, was wonderfully anguished.
1627. Feltham, Resolves, I. viii. (1677), 11. Sores are not to be anguish’t with a rustic pressure.
1797. Encycl. Brit., IV. 341/1. s.v. Charade, My first … anguishes the toe of a man.
1855. Cdl. Wiseman, Fabiola, 338. It was … the making him doubly a fratricide, which deeply anguished her.
† 2. refl. Obs. rare.
1538. Latimer, Serm. & Rem. (1845), 397. I will no longer anguish myself with a matter that I cannot remedy.
3. intr. (refl. pron. omitted.) To distress oneself, suffer severe pain or sorrow.
c. 1330. R. Brunne, Chron., 132. Kyng Henry … anguised greuosly, þat Thomas was so slayn.
1601. J. Weever, Mirr. Martyrs, D ij b. Whose soules with sin-empoisning hate did anguish.
1624. Bargrave, Serm., 36. Thy bones anguish, thy limbes sinke under thee.
1820. Keats, Isabella, vii. He had waked and anguished A dreary night of love and misery.
† 4. ? To smother, quash, crush, put down. (Cf. OFr. angoissier = ‘serrer fortement, presser, étreindre vivement, sans idée de souffrance.’ Godef.) Obs. rare.
1502. Ord. Crysten Men (W. de Worde), III. iii. 157. The .vii. maner of almesdede spyrytuall is to hyde, to couer, and to anghysshe ye yll and defame of his neyboure.
