[UN-1 12: cf. next.]
1. Want of luck; unlucky character or fortune.
1561. T. Hoby, trans. Castiglione’s Courtyer, IV. U vij b. You haue better declared the vnluckinesse of yonge men, then the happynesse of olde menn.
1638. Sir T. Herbert, Trav. (ed. 2), 227. Black … they call … a type of hell, and unluckinesse.
1673. Kirkman, Unlucky Citizen, A 5 b. Although I had been unlucky, yet I my own self caused that unluckyness.
1734. Mrs. Delany, Life & Corr. (1861), I. 452. A piece of unluckiness of yours which has disappointed and mortified me.
1835. Wilson’s Tales Borders, I. 65/1. The luckiness or unluckiness of a First Foot.
1897. E. W. B. Nicholson, Golspie, 67. A belief in the unluckiness of Friday is of course very common, I suppose from the Crucifixion having taken place on that day.
2. Tendency to mischief.
1760–72. H. Brooke, Fool of Qual. (1809), I. 163. Ned … would not willingly have exchanged his unluckiness for the heirship of an estate. Ibid., 174. Ned’s natural unluckiness.
