[f. STALE a.1 + -NESS.] The condition of being stale, in any sense of the adj.
1552. Huloet, Stalenes, vetustas.
1577–87. Holinshed, Hist. Eng., I. 53/2. So that more than necessitie compelled him he could not eat, by reason that the stalenesse tooke awaie the pleasant tast thereof, and lesse prouoked his appetite.
1602. T. Phelippes, in St. Papers, Dom. 1601–3 (1870), 227. I shall send you what [report] comes to hand, if staleness make it not like Rye fish, unfit for market.
1608. Shaks., Per., V. i. 58. Wee are not destitute for want, but wearie for the stalenesse.
1620. Venner, Via Recta, ii. 39. If it [beer] be kept vntouched, till that it hath gotten a sufficient stalenesse.
1844. H. Stephens, Bk. Farm, II. 725. Failures in hatching arise from want of impregnation in the egg—from age, commonly called staleness.
1868. Field, 4 July, 14/2. Probably his continued rowing at Oxford nearly the whole year through may have tended to produce staleness.
1891. Law Times, XCII. 127/2. The defence based on the staleness of the claim could not … prevail.
† b. pl. quasi-concr. Stale remarks or arguments.
1617. Collins, Def. Bp. Ely, II. vi. 227. He is not ashamed to renew such motheaten stalenesses.
