a. Chiefly poet. [OE. sunbeorht occurs in sense 2.]
1. Bright as the sun; supremely bright. (Often in hyperbolical use; also fig.)
1579. Spenser, Sheph. Cal., Oct., 72. Sonnebright honour pend in shamefull coupe.
1591. Shaks., Two Gent., III. i. 88. How, and which way I may bestow my selfe To be regarded in her sun-bright eye.
1642. H. More, Song of Soul, I. i. 3. The fulvid Eagle with her sun-bright eye.
1667. Milton, P. L., VI. 100. High in the midst exalted as a God Th’ Apostat in his Sun-bright Chariot sate.
1747. D. Mallet, Amyntor & Theodora, Wks. 1759, I. 153. As reason thus the mental storm seren’d And thro the darkness sent her sun-bright ray.
1883. W. Arthur, Fernley Lect., 73. Till over the sunbright thoughts of man themselves the last word to be uttered must be ‘clay to clay’?
2. Bright with sunshine; illumined by the sun.
1744. Akenside, Pleas. Imag., III. 360. For not the expanse Of living lakes in Summer’s noontide calm, Reflects the … sun-bright heavens With fairer semblance.
1827. Keble, Chr. Y., St. James’ Day. Tabor’s sunbright steep.
a. 1835. Mrs. Hemans, Maremma, xxiv. A sun-bright waste of beauty.
1894. Stevenson & L. Osbourne, Ebb Tide, iii. The green of sunbright foliage.
