a. and sb. Also 7–8 coæval(l, 7 coevall. [f. L. coæv-us (see COEVE) + -AL.]
A. adj. Const. with, † to.
1. Of equal antiquity, of contemporaneous origin, going back to the same date.
1622–62. Heylin, Cosmogr. (1682), Pref. Episcopacy was coæval with the Church it self.
1690. Locke, Hum. Und., II. i. (1695), 49. I conceive that Ideas in the Understanding, are coeval with Sensation.
1722. Wollaston, Relig. Nat., ix. 208. Coeval to mankind itself, and born with it.
1877. J. D. Chambers, Div. Worship, 153. This custom of so standing is coeval with Christianity in England.
2. Of the same age, equally old, having existed or lived the same number of years.
a. 1700. Dryden, Fables, Meleager. Those Trees … Coeval with the World, a venerable Sight.
1742. Fielding, J. Andrews, III. i. Mrs. Towwouse is coeval with our lawyer.
1811. L. M. Hawkins, C’tess & Gertr., 62. There was, in a rising generation, something … which she had not perceived in that co-eval with herself.
3. Living or existing at the same time or in the same age of the world; contemporary.
1704. Hearne, Duct. Hist. (1714), I. 403. They all flourish’d between the Fortieth and Fiftieth Olympiads, and must have been Co-eval.
1823. Month. Mag., LV. 516. The captivity of Zedekiah, which was coeval with the death of Hophra.
1862. Dana, Man. Geol., 583. The [human] bones belonged to an ancient tribe which was coeval with some of the extinct Mammals.
4. Of coincident duration, lasting to the same age or time.
1742. Young, Nt. Th., VII. 86. Were men to live coëval with the sun, The patriarch-pupil would be learning still.
1801. Southey, Thalaba, II. xiv. The Boy, coeval with whose life Yon magic Fire must burn.
1886. Froude, Oceana, ii. 24. Ovid … claims at the close of his ‘Metamorphoses’ to have built a monument which will be coeval with mankind.
B. sb.
1. One who is of the same age or standing in point of time with another or others.
1656. Blount, Glossogr., Coevals, that are of the same age.
1739. Cibber, Apol. (1756), I. 51. With my coævals as well as with the millions since born.
1823. Lamb, Elia (1860), 84. He is forlorn among his coevals: his juniors cannot be his friends.
2. A person (or thing) belonging to the same period or age of the world; a contemporary.
1605. Bacon, Adv. Learn., II. ii. § 14. It may seeme they [scyences] are ordained by God to be Coevalls, that is, to meete in one age.
1644. Bulwer, Chiron., 6. Hortensius, a long time Prince of Orators, afterwards Coevall and Competitour with Cicero.
1784. Cowper, Task, III. 142. The man, of whom His own coevals took but little note.
1870. Lowell, Among My Books, Ser. I. (1873), 341. Neither his precepts nor his practice influenced any one of his greater coevals.
3. One who lives to the same point of time with another.
1878. E. White, Life in Christ, I. i. 5. The relation of man to the Deity as his destined coeval.
