adj. (old English and American).—Angry; vexed. TO GET ONE’S MAD UP = to get angered. Also as verb.
1369. CHAUCER, Troilus and Criseyde [SKEAT, 1894], line 479. Ne made him thus in armes for to MADDE.
1593. SHAKESPEARE, Titus Andronicus, iii. x. 104.
| Had I but seen thy picture in this plight, | |
| It would have MADDED me. | |
| Ibid. iii. i. 223. | |
| If the winds rage doth not the sea wax MAD. |
1598. JONSON, Every Man in his Humour, iv. 1. You’d MAD the patient’st body in the world.
1607. MIDDLETON, Your Five Gallants, i. 2.
| They’re MAD she grac’d me with one private minute | |
| Above their fortunes. |
1611. Acts XXVI. 11 [Authorised Version]. And being exceeding MAD against them, I persecuted them even unto strange cities.
1667. PEPYS, Diary, iv. 482 [BICKERS, 1875]. The King is MAD at her entertaining Jermin, and she is MAD at Jermin’s going to marry from her, so they are all MAD; and so the kingdom is governed.
1816. PICKERING, A Vocabulary … U.S.A., s.v. MAD, in the sense of ‘angry,’ is considered as a low word in this country, and at the present day is never used except in very familiar conversation.
1824. R. B. PEAKE, Americans Abroad, i. 1. I guess—I’m MADDED, but I’ll bite in my breath a bit—not that I’m sitch a tarnation fool as to believe all you tell me.
1848. RUXTON, Life in the Far West, p. 167. That nation is MAD.
1871. New Era, April [DE VERE]. The Squire’s MAD riz.
1891. N. GOULD, The Double Event, p. 189. My eye! won’t he be just MAD.
LIKE MAD. See LIKE.
MAD AS A HATTER, phr. (colloquial).—Violently angry; crazy. [HATTER = atter = adder.]
MAD AS A MARCH HARE, phr. (colloquial).—As mad as may be.
d. 1535. MORE, A Supplycacion of Soulys, C. ii. As MAD, not AS MARCHE HARE, but as a madde dogge.
1597. HEYWOOD, Epigrams, 95.
| As MAD AS A MARCH HARE: where madness compares, | |
| Are not Midsummer hares as MAD AS MARCH HARES? |
1609. FLETCHER, The Wild-Goose Chase, iv. 3. They are all, all mad: I came from a world of mad women, MAD AS MARCH HARES.
1651. TATHAM, The Distracted State, iv. 1.
| Adul. My lord, ’tis done! | |
| I am as MAD AS a MARCH HARE upon’t. |
1665. Homer à la Mode [NARES].
| Therefore, ere since this cunning archer | |
| Has been AS MAD AS any MARCH HARE. |
1678. COTTON, Virgil Travestie, in Works (1725), Bk. iv. p. 73.
| Thy little Archer | |
| Has made our Dido MAD AS MARCH-HARE. |
1754. FOOTE, The Knights, i. Mother’s as MAD AS A MARCH HARE about it.
1760. COLMAN, Polly Honeycombe, i. 4. She’s downright raving—MAD AS A MARCH HARE.
d. 1796. BURNS, Epistle to J. Rankine, 13. It pits me ay AS MAD’S A HARE.
1841. The Comic Almanack, p. 260. Vell, I’ve heard of ‘MAD AS A MARCH AIR,’ and precious mad I find it is, still I can’t say as I care: as long as I get home safe.
1851. Notes and Queries, 20 Sept., p. 208. Perhaps the allusion to the well-known saying, AS MAD AS A MARCH HARE, on this occasion was made without the collector of hareskins being aware of the existence of such a saying.
