Also 7 -tud. [ad. L. longitūdo, f. longus LONG a. Cf. F. longitude.]
1. Length, longitudinal extent; occas. an instance of this; a length; a long figure. † Also, tallness, height. Now chiefly jocular.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., VIII. xxiv. (1495), 335. Orion … his lengthe and longitude stretchyth nyghe to the brede and latitude of thre synges.
c. 1420. Pallad. on Husb., IV. 431. And of the claue Is best an handful greet in crassitude And cubital let make her longitude.
c. 1470. MS. Lambeth No. 306, in Rel. Ant., I. 200. The longitude of men folowyng. Moyses xiij. fote and viij ynches and half [etc.].
1589. Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, II. xi[i]. (Arb.), 114. A bastard or imperfect rounde declining toward a longitude.
1607. Rowlands, Famous Hist., 64. Thy Giants longitude shall shorter shrink.
1653. R. Sanders, Physiogn., 161. The forehead … its … Longitude is from one temple to the other.
1669. Sturmy, Mariner’s Mag., I. 23. A Superficies is a Longitude, having only Latitude.
1784. Cowper, Task, V. 11. Mine [sc. a shadow] spindling into longitude immense.
1814. Scott, Wav., xviii. A petticoat, of scanty longitude. Ibid. (1824), St. Ronan’s, xvii. The direct longitude of their promenade never exceeded a hundred yards.
1824. Examiner, 555/2. A longitude of beard that would honour a pubescent Jew.
1867. Howells, Ital. Journ., iii. 23. One may walk long through the longitude and rectitude of many of her streets.
1869. Rogers, Pref. Adam Smith’s W. Nat., I. 11. The wisdom of government is to limit that border land to the narrowest possible longitude.
2. Length (in immaterial senses, esp. of time); long continuance. Now rare.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts (1658), 499. The curing of a Horse waxing hot with weariness and longitude of the way.
1613. M. Ridley, Magn. Bodies, Pref. Magn. 5. These men have found insteed of the longitude of places, a longitude of unprofitable labors.
a. 1626. Bp. Andrewes, Serm. (1661), 15. The longitude, or continuance of the joy.
1661. Lovell, Hist. Anim. & Min., 437. Of longitude or brevity of a disease.
1692. Bentley, Boyle Lect., 226. According to quantity of matter and longitude of distance.
1902. N. & Q., 9th Ser. IX. 198/2. The life of the artist is all too brief for the exacting longitude of art.
3. Geog. † a. The extent lengthwise (i.e., from east to west) of the habitable world as known to the ancients (obs.). b. Distance east or west on the earth’s surface, measured by the angle that the meridian of a particular place makes with some standard meridian, as (in England) that of Greenwich. It is reckoned to 180° east or west, and is expressed either in degrees, minutes, and seconds, or in time (15° being equivalent to 1 hour). Abbreviated long. † c. occas. = Difference of longitude (between two places). † d. In the 18th c. sometimes confusedly used for: The method of ascertaining longitude at sea. Obs.
c. 1391. Chaucer, Astrol., II. § 39. The arch of the equinoxial, that is conteyned or bounded by-twixe the 2 meridians, is cleped the longitude of the toun.
1432–50. trans. Higden (Rolls), I. 45. The longitude of the erthe habitable from the este to the weste … hath viijthe tymes v. tymes a clxxti myles and viijthe.
1527. R. Thorne, His Booke, in Hakluyt (1589), 253. The longitude … is counted from West to East.
1551. Robinson, trans. More’s Utop. (1895), p. xcix. (Giles to Buslyde), I will be hable … to instructe you … in the longitude or true meridian of the ylande.
1594. J. Davis, Seaman’s Secr. (1880), 284. The longitude between place and place, is the portion of the Equator, which is contained betweene the Meridians of the same places.
1625. N. Carpenter, Geog. Del., I. xi. (1635), 235. Places inioying the same Longitude are not alwayes equally distant from the first Meridian.
1712. Steele, Spect., No. 428, ¶ 1. The late noble Inventor of the Longitude.
1791. Boswell, Johnson, an. 1755 (1847), 99/1. Mr. Williams … had made many ingenious advances towards a discovery of the longitude.
1812–6. Playfair, Nat. Phil., II. 61. The hour, as reckoned under any two meridians, is different, and the difference is proportional to the difference of longitude.
1831. Brewster, Newton (1855), I. xiii. 350. The determination of the longitude at sea by observing the distance of the moon from the stars.
1841. Elphinstone, Hist. India, II. 197. About the middle of the seventy-sixth degree of east longitude.
1878. Huxley, Physiogr., xix. (ed. 2), 329. All lines of longitude form circles which have the earth’s centre as their centre.
fig. 1852. Mrs. Stowe, Uncle Tom’s C., xvi. 143. As if determined fully to ascertain her longitude and position, before she committed herself.
4. Astron. The distance in degrees reckoned eastward on the ecliptic from the vernal equinoctial point to a circle at right angles to the ecliptic through the heavenly body (or the point on the celestial sphere) whose longitude is required. (See also GEOCENTRIC, HELIOCENTRIC, HELIOGRAPHIC.) † Also occas. in the etymologically prior sense: The length or total extent of the ecliptic or of the sun’s annual course.
The use of latitude (see LATITUDE 5) to denote distance from the ecliptic determined the astronomical application of the corresponding term longitude.
Circle of longitude: see CIRCLE sb. 2.
c. 1391. Chaucer, Astrol., II. § 40. Knowe by thyn almenak the degree of the ecliptik of any signe in which that the planete is rekned for to be, and that is cleped the degree of his longitude.
1551. Recorde, Cast. Knowl. (1556), 176. So doo they call the motion of them [the Planetes] in Longitude, theyr distaunce by theyr naturall course from the beginninge of Aries.
1594. Blundevil, Exerc., Introd. (1636), 435. The Ecliptique line containeth 360 degrees, which is the Longitude of Heaven, and the first degree of the Longitude of any Starre beginneth at the first point of Aries.
1667. Milton, P. L., VII. 373. The glorious Lamp,… Regent of Day,… jocond to run His Longitude through Heav’ns high rode.
1725. Pope, Odyss., XIX. 350. Before the sun His annual longitude of heav’n shall run.
1834. Mrs. Somerville, Connex. Phys. Sci. (1849), 11. The mean or circular motion of a body estimated from the vernal equinox, is its mean longitude; and its elliptical, or true motion, reckoned from that point, is its true longitude.
1867. Denison, Astron. without Math., 270. Geocentric or common celestial longitude.
5. Comb., as longitude-table; † longitude hunter, one bent on inventing a method for ascertaining the longitude; longitude star (see quot.); longitude watch, a chronometer for use in ascertaining the longitude.
1738. Weddell, Voy. up Thames, 64. At College they had been pestered with so many crack-brain’d *Longitude-Hunters.
1842. G. W. Francis, Dict. Arts, etc., *Longitude Stars, a term frequently used to denote those fixed stars which have been selected for the purpose of finding the longitude by lunar observations. The chief of these are as follows:—Aldebaran, Pollux, Regulus, Spica Virginis, Antares, Formanault, and the largest star in Aquila.
1790. Margetts (title), *Longitude Tables.
1763. Ann. Reg., Chron., 100. The trial of Mr. Harrison’s *longitude watch.
