a. Also 6 shottishe. [f. SOT sb.1 + -ISH.]
† 1. Foolish, doltish, stupid: a. Of persons, or their faculties. Obs.
1566. Drant, Horace, Sat., II. iii. F viij. Ye shottishe, dotishe, doultishe dawes.
1583. Greene, Mamillia, Wks. (Grosart), II. 292. I meane not to be so … sottish as with free consent to crosse my selfe with perpetuall calamitie.
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., I. ii. III. xiv. (1651), 126. Such are many sottish Princes, brought into a fools Paradise by their parasites.
1678. R. L’Estrange, Seneca’s Mor., I. xi. (1696), 47. The sottish Extract of an ancient Nobility may be preferr’d before a better Man.
1708. Swift, Predict. for 1708, Wks. 1755, II. I. 150. How ignorant those sottish pretenders to astrology are in their own concerns.
1737. Whiston, Josephus, Antiq., IX. xii. § 3. This king was so sottish and thoughtless of what was for his own good, that he would not leave off worshipping the Syrian gods when he was beaten by them.
† b. Of things or actions. Obs.
1586. A. Day, Eng. Secretary, II. (1625), 87. What is it that this blinde and sottish love draweth not a man headlong into?
1614. Raleigh, Hist. World, I. 181. It were sottish to conceive, that he would permit the Divell … to raise a Prophet from the dead in Saul’s respect.
1641. Milton, Ch. Govt., II. ii. Wks. 1851, III. 155. O but … the sottish absurdity of this excuse!
1692. Bentley, Boyle Lect., ii. 62. It’s altogether as reasonable as this sottish opinion of the Atheists.
1755. B. Martin, Mag. Arts & Sci., 169. ’Tis sottish to imagine that they were made to answer no End, but Man’s Luxury, Diversion, or Use.
1796. Bp. Watson, Apol. Bible, 207. A style of extreme arrogance, and sottish self-sufficiency.
2. Given or addicted to, characterized or affected by, excessive drinking or coarse self-indulgence. Also absol.
1632. Lithgow, Trav., III. 92. A right name for so sottish a fellow, for … I neuer saw him … truely sober.
1642. D. Rogers, Naaman, 4. Implunged into a life of sence and sottish sensuality.
a. 1721. Sheffield (Dk. Buckhm.), Wks. (1753), II. 160. What else are … the sottish debauches … of Alexander the Great?
1785. Paley, Mor. Philos., III. iii. ix. I would make choice of … a town-life, for the mercenary and sottish.
1811. A. T. Thomson, Lond. Disp. (1818), 292. The effects of opium … are … loss of appetite and a sottish appearance.
1849. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., iv. I. 453. People who saw him only over his bottle would have supposed him to be a man gross indeed, sottish, and addicted to low company.
1871. C. Gibbon, Lack of Gold, xii. His face was sallow and sottish.
Comb. 1856. R. A. Vaughan, Mystics (1860), I. 150. A slipshod, sottish-looking tailor.
