[f. BLOOM v.1]
1. The action or state of coming into or being in bloom. Also fig.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XVII. xcvi. (1495), 663. Al codware louyth water tofore the blossom and drinesse after the blowmynge.
c. 1630. Drumm. of Hawth., Wks. (1711), 12. A virgin in the blooming of her prime.
1684. Scanderbeg Rediv., i. 2. To know the first Bloomings of a Tree which has yielded such happy Fruit.
1709. Pope, Ess. Crit., 501. Like some fair flow’r … That gayly blooms, but ev’n in blooming dies.
b. concr. A blossom, inflorescence. Obs.
1622. Wither, Mistr. Philar. (1633), 590. Low Sallowes on whose bloomings Bees doe fall.
1657. W. Coles, Adam in Eden, lx. Small heads … which are the bloomings or Flowers.
c. attrib., as in blooming-time.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., XVII. clxxvii. (1495), 718. Vynes haue a specyall euyll whan they ben spronge wyth euyll dewe or reyne in blowmyng tyme.
1883. C. Monkhouse, in Academy, No. 577. 358/3. A true, if not a complete, view of English song-writing in its blooming-time.
2. Painting. A cloudy appearance on a varnished surface, esp. of a picture. Cf. BLOOM v. 6.
1859. Gullick & Timbs, Paint., 204. The vehicles of the oil painter subject him to innumerable perplexities by their bad drying, change of colour, cracking, and blooming.
1879. Cassell’s Techn. Educ., IV. 222/2. Spotting, blooming, pin-holing.
