Forms: 4–7 calme, 6 cawme, 7– calm. [ME. calme, a. F. calme (16th c. in Littré, in 15th c. carme) in same sense, ad. It. or Sp. (also Pg.) calma.
Since calma in OSp. and Pg. means also ‘heat of the day,’ Diez, comparing mod. Pr. chaume ‘resting-time of the cattle,’ and Rumansch calma, cauma ‘a shady resting-place for cattle,’ thought calma possibly derived from late L. f. cauma (occurring in Vulg., Job xxx. 30), a. Gr. καῦμα ‘burning heat, fever heat, heat of the sun, heat of the day,’ used also in med.L. of the burning heat of the sun. Taken in connection with the senses of the Rumansch and Provençal words this gives the possible development of meaning ‘burning heat, heat of the day, rest during the heat of the day, quiet, stillness’; but it is notable that It. calma has no sense of ‘heat,’ only ‘a calme, or quiet faire weather’ (Florio). As to the phonetic change of au to al, Diez suggested popular assoc. with calēre to be hot, calor heat, which Schuchardt also (Romania IV. 255) thinks probable; the latter has given other instances of the phonetic change in Vokalismus des Vulgärlateins, I. 494–6 and III. 316.]
1. Stillness, quiet, tranquillity, serenity; freedom from agitation or disturbance.
1393. Gower, Conf., III. 230. As the … rage Of windes maketh the see salvage And that was calme bringth into wawe.
c. 1400. Destr. Troy, 13157. All the calme ouercast into kene stormes.
c. 1450. Chaucer’s Dreme, 1384. All was one, calme, or tempest.
1526. Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W., 1531), 252. The colde, the hete, the cawme, the frost, ye snowe.
1530. Palsgr., 202/2. Calme, styll whether, carme.
1611. Bible, Matt. viii. 26. Then hee arose, and rebuked the winds and the Sea, and there was a great calme.
1613. Shaks., Hen. VIII., III. i. 166. A Soule as euen as a Calme.
1822. Hazlitt, Table-t., Ser. II. iv. (1869), 85. Before and after earthquakes there is a calm in the air.
1850. Tennyson, In Mem., xi. Calm on the seas, and silver sleep.
1868. J. E. H. Skinner, Roughing it, 253. By the rock of Pontiko there was a sheet of breathless calm.
b. absolute want of wind: often in pl. calms.
Region of calms, a belt of the ocean near the equator, lying between the regions of the north-east and south-east trade winds.
1517. Torkington, Pilgr. (1884), 57. [We] fonde the wynde a gens vs or ellys … calmys.
1627. Capt. Smith, Seaman’s Gram., x. 46. When there is not a breath of wind stirring, it is a calme or a starke calme.
1709. Lond. Gaz., No. 4547/2. By reason of Calms he could not come up with them ’till the 6th.
1799. Med. Jrnl., I. 96. A calm prevailed, and the heat was extreme.
1812. J. Wilson, Isle of Palms, III. 923. Chain’d in tropic calms.
1857. H. Reed, Lect. Brit. Poets, II. xii. 113. The misery of a dead calm beneath a torrid sky.
c. fig. (to a and b.) of social or political conditions and circumstances.
1547. J. Harrison, Exhort. Scottes, 210. The stormes of this tempestious worlde, shall shortely come to a calme.
1606. Shaks., Tr. & Cr., I. iii. 100. The vnity and married calme of States.
1781. Cowper, Friendsh., xxiii. Religion should … make a calm of human life.
a. 1850. Calhoun, Wks. (1874), IV. 24. Till our free and popular institutions are succeeded by the calm of despotism.
d. fig. of the mind, feelings or demeanor; = CALMNESS.
1606. Shaks., Tr. & Cr., IV. i. 15. Our blouds are now in calme.
1719. De Foe, Crusoe (1840), I. xiv. 236. All my calm of mind … seemed to be suspended.
1807. Wordsw., Sonn. Lib., To Clarkson. A good man’s calm, A great man’s happiness.
1879. Farrar, St. Paul, II. 376. In that desperate crisis one man retained his calm and courage.
2. attrib. and in comb.
1865. Intell. Observ., No. 46. 253. The ‘calm belt’ of the equator.
1886. Pall Mall Gaz., 20 July, 4/2. Now the birds are storm-makers, and in another moment they are calm-bringers.
