[f. prec.]
† 1. trans. To condition, surround with conditions.
c. 1400. Apol. Loll., 101. Þan if þe vowe of religioun is circumstaunsid, þan it is plesing to God.
1736. Butler, Anal., I. vii. 125. Interpositions so guarded and circumstanced, as would preclude all Mischief arising from them.
2. To place in particular circumstances or relations to other things. Chiefly in pa. pple.
1644. T. Case, Quarrell of Covenant, 48. It is this Prelacy, thus cloathed, thus circumstanc’t, which we swear to extirpate.
1667. Boyle, in Phil. Trans., II. 608. One [Trial] may suffice, circumstanc’d like that which I shall now relate.
1738. J. Keill, Anim. Oecon., 251. So to circumstance the Warmth of a Fire, that it shall diffuse … an equal and natural Warmth.
1818. B. O’Reilly, Greenland, 197. Many ships … are at the same time dangerously circumstanced amongst packed ice.
1836. Marryat, Midsh. Easy, xxxviii. He knows how I am circumstanced.
† 3. To furnish with details, set forth with attendant circumstances. Obs.
1654. R. Whitlock, Ζωοτομια, A iiij. Thy characters so circumstance each sin, As ’t not Describ’d, but had Embowell’d bin.
1712. Addison, Spect., No. 351, ¶ 4. The Poet took the matters of Fact as they came down to him, and circumstanced them after his own manner.
1713. Guardian (1756), I. No. 78. 346. A chapter or two of the Theory of the Conflagration, well circumstanced, and done into verse.
1774. J. Bryant, Mythol., II. 354. If we consider these articles, as they are here circumstanced.
Hence Circumstancing vbl. sb.
1801. Month. Mag., XII. 579. A contrived and providential circumstancing of the subjects of his attention.
