ppl. a. [UN-1 8. Cf. MDu. ongebreidelt.]
1. fig. Not restrained or held in check; absolutely uncontrolled or ungoverned: a. Of conduct, feeling, utterance, etc.
c. 1374. Chaucer, Troylus, III. 429. He … in hym self wiþ manbod gan restreyne, Eche rakel dede and eche vnbrydled chere.
c. 1412. Hoccleve, De Reg. Princ., 2433. Vnbridlid wordes ofte man by-weepiþ.
1412–20. Lydg., Chron. Troy, I. 2019. No cher vnbridled þat tyme hir asterte.
c. 1530. Remedy of Love, Prol. Seeing the manifolde inconuenience Falling by vnbrideled prosperitie.
1561. T. Norton, Calvin’s Inst., I. 4. We reade of none that euer did breake forth into more presumptuous and vnbridled despising of God, than Caius Caligula.
1590. Swinburne, Testaments, 200. By this meane to restraine the vnbrideled lusts of some.
1626. T. H[awkins], trans. Caussin’s Holy Crt., 120. After the concupiscences of the belly, commeth vnbridled irreuerence.
1642. Milton, Apol. Smect., Wks. 1851, III. 273. I go on to shew you the unbridl’d impudence of this loose rayler.
1711. Steele, Spect., No. 38, ¶ 5. When we give the Passion for Praise an unbridled Liberty.
1751. Earl Orrery, Remarks Swift (1752), 99. A wild unbridled indulgence of his own humour and disposition.
1821. Scott, Kenilw., xxxi. His flights are too unbridled for any place but Parnassus.
1855. Paley, Æschylus, Pref. (1861), p. xxiii. To keep in check the otherwise unbridled passions of a fickle multitude.
1888. Bryce, Amer. Commw., I. iii. 25, note. An alarming example of what the unbridled rule of the multitude may come to.
b. Of persons, the mind, tongue, etc.
a. 1547. Surrey, Paraphr. Ps. lv. 13. Rayne those vnbrydled tungs; breake that coniured league.
a. 1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. V., 56 b. When he had once tamed and framed to his purpose this young unbrideled gentleman.
1581. A. Hall, Iliad, IV. 69. After our vnbrideled youth coms sage and wrinckled yeares.
1606. Shaks., Tr. & Cr., III. ii. 130. My thoughts were like vnbrideled children grow[n] Too headstrong for their mother.
1644. Milton, Areop. (Arb.), 37. Nævius was quickly cast into prison for his unbridl’d pen.
1676. Hobbes, Iliad, I. 322. That they may be To Gods and Men, and to th’ unbridled man My witnesses.
1840. Alison, Hist. Eur., VIII. liii. § 39. 433. The usual … intemperance of the unbridled populace of great towns.
1876. Bancroft, Hist. U.S., I. xviii. 517. They were exposed, without defence, to the fury of an unbridled soldiery.
c. Of natural forces.
1814[?]. Wordsw., Brownie’s Cell, 64. Towers rent, winds combating with woods, Lands deluged by unbridled floods.
2. Not furnished with a bridle.
1553. Eden, Treat. New Ind. (Arb.), 16. They are all vnbrideled, hauinge neither withe nor coller aboute theyr neckes.
1600. Hakluyt, Voy., III. 315. They fel on running like vnbridled horses, through the middest of the thickest woods.
1656. Earl Monm., trans. Boccalini, Pol. Touchstone (1674), 253. That unbridled Horse which the State bears for her Ensign.
1694. Motteux, Rabelais, IV. xlviii. 188. An unbridled Mule, with green Trappings.
1798. Hull Advertiser, 8 Sept., 1/4. Our picquets were attacked; this caused some bustle, as our horses were all unbridled.
1841. Spalding, Italy & It. Isl., II. 27. Pride, clothed in a lion’s skin, rushes forward on an unbridled horse.
1872. Head, Sel. Grk. Coins Brit. Mus., 16. The unbridled horse may be a symbol of Liberty.
Hence Unbridledly adv.; Unbridledness.
1561. T. Norton, Calvin’s Inst., I. 37. Yet the boldnesse of Sophisters could not be restrained by them from babling *vnbrideledly.
1591. Sylvester, Du Bartas, I. vii. 211. Yet true it is, that humane things (seem) slide Unbridledly with so uncertain tide [etc.].
1571. Golding, Calvin on Ps. v. 5. With howe muche more *unbrydlednesse his enemies ronne royet.
a. 1639. W. Whateley, Prototypes, II. xxvi. (1640), 65. The unbridlednesse of your evill natures.
a. 1684. Leighton, Comm. 1 Pet. v. (1819), II. 322. The presumption and unbridledness of youth require the pressing and binding on of this rule.
