a. Obs. [See prec. and -AL.] a. = VENEFIC a. Also fig. b. Practising, associated with, malignant sorcery or witchcraft.

1

1584.  R. Scot, Discov. Witchcr., VI. iv. (1886), 95, marg. Of a butcher a right veneficall witch.

2

1609.  B. Jonson, Masque of Queens, Wks. (Rtldg.), 566. These witches … came forth … with spindles, timbrels, rattles, or other venefical instruments.

3

1652.  Gaule, Magastrom., 39. This they urge as a proof of the possibility of veneficall and metamorphosing or transforming magick.

4

1715.  M. Davies, Athen. Brit., I. Pref. 57. The loose sheets of Northern Sorceries, translated from the original Code of the venefical Text. Ibid. (1716), II. To Rdr. 9. The same Contagious and Venefical Distemper of Brains and Body.

5

  Hence † Venefically adv. Obs.

6

1652.  Gaule, Magastrom., 280. A magician … wrought it venefically, so that the poore man fell suddenly into a strange disease.

7