Also 5–6 -te, 6–7 -tie. [a. Fr. animosité, f. L. animōsitātem, n. of quality f. animōs-us spirited: see ANIMOUS.]
† 1. Spiritedness, high spirit, courage, bravery. Obs.
1432–50. trans. Higden (1865), I. 61. The cause is for euery thynge is of more animosite and audacite in his vniversalle then his parte parcialle.
1589. Puttenham, Eng. Poesie (Arb.), 296. It was thought a decent countenance and constant animositie in the king to be so affected.
1658. Sir T. Browne, Hydriot., iv. 66. Confirming his wavering hand unto the animosity of that attempt.
a. 1670. Hacket, Abp. Williams, I. (1692), 20. Such as are of a high-flown animosity affect fortunas laciniosas.
2. Excitement of feeling against any one; hostility of mind tending to break out into action, active hatred or enmity.
1605. Bacon, Adv. Learn., II. xxiii. § 48 (1873), 249. The natures and dispositions of the people … their animosities and discontents.
1644. Heylin, Laud, II. 349. To foment those animosities … raised in that nation against the King.
1660. in Somers’s Tracts, II. 168. To forget what is past, and lay aside all Animosities for the future.
1674. Owen, Holy Spirit (1693), 204. Forming new Parties and reviving old Animosities.
1754. Hume, Hist. Eng., ii. It is a just remark, that the more affinity there is between theological parties, the greater commonly is their animosity.
1852. McCulloch, Taxation, I. ii. 84. The jealousies and animosities that formerly subsisted between the privileged classes and the mass of the people.
