Forms: 4–5 legand(e, 4, 6 legeand, 4–7 legende, 5–6 -ent(e, 6 -eant, 5– legend. [a. F. légende (recorded from 12th c.) = Sp. leyenda, Pg. legenda, lenda, It. leggenda, ad. med.L. legenda ‘what is read,’ f. legĕre to read.
For the formation of fem. verbals from the gerundive stem, cf. med.L. præbenda ‘prebend,’ It. lavanda washing, etc.]
1. The story of the life of a Saint.
c. 1375. Sc. Leg. Saints, xiii. (Marcus), 108. To sancte march turnand myn hand, as I in his legand fand.
c. 1386. Chaucer, Nun’s Pr. T., 301. In the lyf of seint kenelm, I rede … how … I hadde leuere than my sherte That ye hadde rad his legende, as haue I.
c. 1430. Life St. Kath. (1884), 65. Thys glorious virgyn seynt Kateryne had alle these ȝeftes as hir legende sheweth tofore.
1500–20. Dunbar, Poems, xxx. 21. In haly legendis haif I hard allevin, Ma sanctis of bischoppis, nor freiris, be sic sevin.
1597. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., V. xx. § 9. Legends being growne in a manner to be nothing els but heapes of friuolous and scandalous vanities.
2. A collection of saints’ lives or of stories of a similar character. The Legend, spec. a mediæval collection of saints’ lives written by Jacobus de Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa, in the 13th century; now usually called the Golden Legend (Legenda Aurea), the name popularly given to it in the Middle Ages.
c. 1340. Cursor M., 20900 (Fairf.). Qua wille haue mare of þis matere rede þe legende & ȝe mai here.
c. 1380. Wyclif, Sel. Wks., III. 344. Aftir bileve of hooli writt, þat telliþ of Petre and oþir apostlis … taken we biside bileve of many oþir þat þei ben seintis, as of Clement and Laurence and oþir þat þe Legende spekiþ of.
1483. Caxton (colophon), Thus endeth the legende named in latyn legenda aurea, that is to saye in englysshe the golden legende.
1611. Cotgr., Legendier, the golden Legend; a booke of the liues of the Saints.
1612. Bacon, Ess., Atheisme (Arb.), 330. I had rather beleeue all the fables in the Legend, and the Alcaron, then that this vniuersall frame is without a minde.
1649. Alcoran, p. ix. They [Mohammedans] invoke their Saints, of whom they have a large Legend.
1662. Stillingfl., Orig. Sacr., I. v. § 5. The next Legend the world hath should be called Legenda Orientalis.
1740. Lady M. W. Montagu, Lett. to Lady Pomfret, 29 June. A belief in all the miracles in the Legend.
† 3. A story, history, account. Obs.
c. 1385. Chaucer, L. G. W., Prol. 473. The moste partye of thyn lyf spende In makynge of a gloryous legende Of goode wemen. Ibid. (c. 1386), Shipman’s T., 145. Thanne wolde I telle a legende of my lyf, What I haue suffred sith I wasa wyf.
1508. Dunbar, Tua mariit wemen, 504. This is the legeand of my lif.
1560. Rolland, Crt. Venus, III. 653. Allegeand baith the ald and new Testamentis Historyis, Scriptouris, & vtheris lang legentis.
1601. Chester, in Shaks. C. Praise, 43. The true legend of famous King Arthur.
1613. Jackson, Creed, II. xxxi. § 11. Christ Jesus, who hath left us these his sacred laws, and legend of his most blessed life.
1616. Bullokar, Legend, a story of olde matters.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett. (1650), 98. Those rambling letters … are nought else than a legend of the cumbersom life and various fortunes of a cadet.
1671. Milton, Samson, 1737. Acts enroll’d In copious Legend, or sweet Lyric Song.
† 4. A roll, list, record. Obs.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. X. 376. Þat I man made was and my name yentred In þe legende of lyf longe er I were.
1536. Bellenden, Cron. Scot. (1821), II. 100. Thocht he be nocht nowmerit amang the legend of papis.
1601. Marston, Pasquil & Kath., I. 356. Sir, I enrowle you in the Legend of my intimates.
5. Eccl. A book of readings or ‘lessons’ for use at divine service, containing passages from Scripture and the lives of saints. Obs. exc. Hist.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 293/2. Legende (S. boke), legenda.
1459. Paston Lett., I. 489. Inprimis, ij. antyfeners. Item, j. legande of hoole servyce.
1482. Will of M. Paston, ibid. III. 283. A compleet legende in oon book, and an antiphoner in an other book.
1549. Act 3 & 4 Edw. VI., c. 10 § 1. All Bookes called … Processionalles, Manuelles, Legends, Pyes, Portuyses, Prymars … shalbe … abolished.
1556. in Warton, Life Sir T. Pope (1772), App. xvi. 319. A fair legeant of parchmente lymned with gold.
1605–6. Act 3 Jas. I., c. 5 § 15. Missals, Breviaries, Portals, Legendes, and Lives of Sainctes.
a. 1746. Lewis, in Gutch, Coll. Cur., II. 165. A Legend; in which were written the Lessons to be read at Mattins.
1849. Rock, Ch. of Fathers, IV. xii. 212. The Legend contained all the lessons out of Holy Writ, and the works of the fathers, read at matins.
6. An unauthentic or non-historical story, esp. one handed down by tradition from early times and popularly regarded as historical.
1613. Purchas, Pilgrimage (1614), 506. That yee may know the Indians want not their Metamorphoses and Legends, they tell that a man … had a daughter, with whom the sunne was in love.
1685. Stillingfl., Orig. Brit., i. 11. Having their minds naturally framed to believe Legends.
1687. T. Brown, Saints in Uproar, Wks. 1730, I. 77. The kingdom … is ten times as populous as when the legend supposes you and your sister-trollops to have lived there.
1768. H. Walpole, Hist. Doubts, 84, note. It would have required half the court of Edward the Fourth to frame a consistent legend.
1838. Thirlwall, Greece, I. 89. To Æolus himself no conquests and no achievements are attributed by the legends of his race.
1860. Hook, Lives Abps., I. vi. 323. The legend which would attribute to Alfred the foundation of the University of Oxford.
1900. G. C. Brodrick, Mem. & Impressions, 156. It was deliberately and skilfully employed to break down what has been called the Gladstonian legend.
1901. Spectator, 23 Feb., 277/2. The voracity of the pike is the subject of innumerable legends.
b. in generalized sense.
1847. Emerson, Repr. Men, Swedenborg, Wks. (Bohn), I. 334. I think of him as of some transmigrating votary of Indian legend.
1855. Milman, Lat. Chr., IV. x. (1864), II. 434. Legend dwells with fond pertinacity on the holiness of the saint.
7. A writing, inscription or motto; chiefly spec. in Numismatics, the words or letters impressed upon a coin or medal.
For attempts to distinguish legend and inscription, not now recognized by numismatists, see quots. 1611, 1727–41.
1611. Cotgr., Legende, a Legende, a Writing; also, the words that be about the edge of a peece of coyne.
1702. Addison, Dial. Medals, iii. 153. We are now come to the Legend or Inscription of our Medals.
1727–41. Chambers, Cycl., s.v., In strictness, the legend differs from the inscription; this last properly signifying words placed on the reverse of a medal, in lieu of figures…. Every medal has properly two legends; that on the front, and that on the reverse.
1855. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., xxi. As … their edges were inscribed with a legend, clipping was not to be apprehended.
1863. Reader, 4 July, 5. ‘Who is Griffiths?’ is now a legend marked in paint on many of the walls about London.
1869. Freeman, Norm. Conq. (1876), III. xi. 38. No legend or effigy marks the graves of these royal Ladies.
b. gen. Written character; writing. rare.
1822. Shelley, Fragm. Unfin. Drama, 152. Like a child’s legend on the tideless sand, Which the first foam erases half, and half Leaves legible.
1836. Cardl. Wiseman, Sci. & Relig., II. viii. 67. The learned … applied themselves to the study of the enchorial, or as it has since been called, the demotic legend.
¶ Misused for LEGION.
1598. Shaks., Merry W., I. iii. 59. She has all the rule of her husbands Purse: he hath a legend of Angels.
1682. Mrs. Behn, Roundheads, V. i. A Legend of his Divels take him for’t.
8. attrib. and Comb., as legend † book, lay, -maker, -monger, tale; legend-circled, -like, -stored adjs.
1495. Duchess of York, in Wills Doctor’s Comm. (Camden), 4. I geve to Sir John More, a *legend boke and a colett boke.
1842. Faber, Styrian Lake, etc. 316. Thou *legend-circled thing, dread Euxine Sea!
1821. Joanna Baillie, Metr. Leg., Wallace, ii. My *legend lay receive.
1563–87. Foxe, A. & M. (1596), 80/1. They seeme more *legendlike than truthlike.
1674. Essex Papers (Camden), I. 282. Legend-like storys.
1621. Fletcher, Wildgoose Chase, II. i. A glorious talker, and a *Legend maker Of idle tales.
1820. W. Tooke, trans. Lucian, I. 519, note. The Christian legend-makers.
1871. Freeman, Norm. Conq. (1876), IV. xvii. 61. Norman panegyrists and legend-makers.
1680. H. More, Apocal. Apoc., 233. No *Legend-mongers, nor intruders of absurd and impossible doctrines.
1893. W. C. Borlase, Age Saints, 13. Warton, in his ‘Lives of the Poets,’ tells a good story about one Gilbert de Stone, a legend-monger of the fourteenth century.
1840. T. A. Trollope, Summer in Brittany, I. 2. The traditions of its gloomy and *legend-stored history.
1605. Bacon, Adv. Learn., I. vii. § 5. 34. That *legend tale of Gregorius Magnus.
