Forms: see TRUE a. [OE. tré(o)wnes, f. tréowe, TRUE + -NESS.]
I. † 1. Trust, confidence; object of trust. Only OE.
c. 888. K. Ælfred, Boeth., xlii. (1899), 149. Drihten ælmihtiʓa God,… þu eart min sceoppend, & min alesend,… min trewnes, & min tohopa.
† 2. = TRUCE sb. 1. Obs. rare.
a. 1400. Siege of Troy, 1058, in Archiv neu. Spr., LXXII. 34. Þeo folk of Grece on heore side Beden Treowenes [v.r. truce] for to abyde.
II. The quality of being true; truth (in various senses).
3. Faithfulness, loyalty: = TRUTH 1.
c. 1290. Beket, 487, in S. Eng. Leg., I. 120. Wel þov wost þat ech of us … Trewenesse we þe sworen ase riȝt was.
1297. R. Glouc. (Rolls), 738. Ac god þouȝte ȝut on hire vor hire triwenesse [v.rr. trewnesse, trewenesse, trunesse].
1583. Golding, Calvin on Deut., viii. 46. God shall … continue faithfull and his trewnesse shall be knowen.
1612. Bacon, Ess., Faction (Arb.), 83. The euen carriage betweene two factions, proceedeth not alwaies of moderation, but of a truenesse to a mans selfe, with end to make vse of both.
1909. P. C. Simpson, Life of Rainy, I. v. 111. The people are a shrewd, hard-headed race of the strongest Scottish fibre, with … not only trueness but deep tenderness of heart.
4. Conformity with fact or reality; verity: = TRUTH 5.
1587. Golding, De Mornay, xxxiv. (1592), 550. I hope I haue now shewed the truenesse and substantialnesse of the Christian Religion, and the vanitie & wickedness of al other Religions.
1861. H. Bonar, God’s Way of Peace, viii. 100–1. It is faith alone, recognising simply the completeness of the great sacrifice for sin, and the trueness of the Father’s testimony to that completeness.
5. Conformity to a standard; accuracy, exactitude: = TRUTH 6.
1594. Blundevil, Exerc., V. (1636), 592. There were no way … to be compared vnto it, neither for the truenesse, easinesse, nor readinesse of working thereby.
1805. Luccock, Nat. Wool, 176. A far more valuable quality … which the wool-grower should observe … called the trueness of the hair.
6. Genuineness; reality, actuality: = TRUTH 7.
1613. Purchas, Pilgrimage, IX. xv. (1614), 912. They make this … one of the Markes of the truenesse and Catholicisme of their Church.
1622. Mabbe, trans. Aleman’s Guzman d’Alf., II. (1623), 198. That seeing the truenesse of the stampe, she might be the sooner molded to entertaine the motion.
1833. Chalmers, Const. Man (1835), I. II. i. 151. The objective trueness of the things which are perceived.
