[f. SPLIT v.]
1. Causing to split or rend.
1593. Shaks., 2 Hen. VI., III. ii. 97. The splitting Rockes cowr’d in the sinking sands. Ibid. (1606), Tr. & Cr., I. iii. 49. When the splitting winde Makes flexible the knees of knotted Oakes.
1624. Capt. Smith, Virginia, III. 64. The flashes of fire from heaven, by which light onely we kept from the splitting shore.
b. Ear-splitting; deafening.
1821. Byron, Sardanap., I. ii. Worse than the rabble’s shout, or splitting trumpet.
1891. Farrar, Darkn. & Dawn, II. lv. 223. The explosions of sound, whose rending, cracking, and splitting outbursts settled into a long continued roar.
c. Croquet. Of a stroke: Causing the balls to go in divergent directions.
1874. J. D. Heath, Croquet-Player, 37. The Splitting Stroke. In this stroke, the two balls … fly off from each other at an angle. It is the most important of the croquet-strokes.
2. Parting asunder; separating by cleavage.
1725. Pope, Odyss., VII. 358. The splitting Raft the furious tempest tore.
1883. Gd. Words, Nov., 732/1. Besides the very small disease germs, there are many ‘splitting fungi,’ that are different in form and turn themselves to other work.
1891. T. Hardy, Tess, I. viii. 100. The fore part of the straight road enlarged with their advance, the two banks dividing like a splitting stick.
3. Extremely fast; very rapid.
1829. in Standard, 6 April (1908), 8/2. On the pistol being fired, the boats went off at a splitting rate.
1865. Dickens, Mut. Fr., III. xv. A weak-spirited, improvident idiot … racing off at a splitting pace for the workhouse.
1873. Routledge’s Young Gentl. Mag., 270/2. At a splitting gallop.
4. Of a headache: Violent, severe. Also fig. of the head.
1847. Mrs. Gore, Castles in Air, III. iii. 49. I woke next morning after a heavy sleep produced by opiates, with a splitting head-ache and every bone in my frame aching.
1857. G. A. Lawrence, Guy Livingstone, iii. 22. Tempting pale men with splitting heads to throw boots at him in the bitterness of their envy as he entered their rooms on the morning after a heavy drink.
1884. Punch, 15 Nov., 230/2. Head split open; splitting headache as result.
1893. Earl Dunmore, Pamirs, II. 191. I had a splitting headache in consequence of my fall.
