adj. (colloquial).—Splendid. Also SPLENDACIOUS; SPLENDIDOUS; and SPLENDIDIOUS.
1538. BALE, Enterlude of Iohan Baptystes [Harleian Miscellany, I. 113]. O tyme most ioyfull, daye most SPLENDIFERUS.
1605. JONSON, Volpone, or the Fox, ii. 1. Worshipful merchants; ay, and senators too, who, ever since my arrival, have detained me to their uses, by their SPLENDIDOUS liberalities.
1605. DRAYTON, Moses, &c., B iii. His brows encircled with SPLENDIDIOUS rays.
1613. TAYLOR (‘The Water Poet’), Odcombs Complaint, Dedication. To the Mirror of Time, the most refulgent, SPLENDIDIOUS, reflecting Court Animal, Don Archibald Armstrong.
1855. HALIBURTON (‘Sam Slick’), Nature and Human Nature, II. 278. To my mind a SPLENDIFEROUS woman and a first chop horse are the noblest works of creation.
1841. E. G. PAIGE (‘Dow, Jr.’), Short Patent Sermons, iv. The SPLENDERIFEROUS splendors that decorate the opposite shore! [‘of the gulf of death’].
1863. C. READE, Hard Cash, xxviii. Where is all your gorgeous attire…. I see the SPLENDIFEROUS articles arrive, and then they vanish for ever.
