ppl. a. [f. prec. + -ED.]
1. Carried on or kept up without cessation; continual, constant.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 91. Contynuyd, kepte wythe-owte cessynge, continuatus.
1532. R. Bowyer, in Strype, Eccl. Mem., I. xvii. 134. By their constitution in the last and yet continued Convocation.
1627–77. Feltham, Resolves, I. xxxix. 65. A continued patience I commend not.
1628. Earle, Microcosm., xlvi. 99. His conversation is a kind of continued complement.
1697. Dryden, Virg. Georg., I. 350. Cold Weather, and continu’d Rain.
1873. E. Peacock, Mabel Heron, I. v. 74. This continued astonishment was a part of her life.
b. Continued fever (see CONTINUAL a. 3).
1776–83. Cullen, First Lines, § 27. Wks. 1827, I. 488. When it happens … that the remission is not considerable … the disease is called a Continued Fever.
1799. Med. Jrnl., II. 301. The second book treats of continued fevers.
1858. J. Copland, Dict. Med., I. 367. Dr. Tweedie has divided continued fever into Simple, Complicated, and Typhus.
2. Extended in space without interruption or breach of connection; continuous.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts (1673), 232. That Horse is best which is of one continued colour.
1630. R. Johnson’s Kingd. & Commw., 342. One continued country, passable from one to the other, without helpe or Sea.
1636. Blunt, Voy. Levant (1637), 8. A hilly country … in a manner a continued Wood, most of Pine trees.
1690. Locke, Hum. Und., II. xxvii. § 3. An Atom, i. e. a continu’d Body, under one immutable Superficies.
1726. Shelvocke, Voy. round World (1757), 190. The ground is burnt up to that degree, that the surface of it appears like one continued cinder.
3. Carried on in a series or sequence; connected or linked together in succession; continuous.
1628. T. Spencer, Logick, 123. A Continued similitude, is when the second terme, is to the third, as the first is to the second.
1667. Milton, P. L., IX. 63. The space of seven continu’d Nights he rode With darkness.
1704. J. Trapp, Abra-Mulé, II. i. One continu’d Series of Misfortunes.
1790. Paley, Horæ Paul., i. 8. [They] have each given a continued history of St. Paul’s life.
4. a. Continued proportionals: a series of quantities such that the ratio is the same between every two adjacent terms; such quantities are said to be in Continued proportion. Continued fraction: a fraction whose denominator is an integer plus a fraction, which latter fraction has for its denominator an integer plus a fraction, and so on.
1796. Hutton, Math. Dict., s.v. Continual Proportionals, A series of continual or continued proportionals is otherwise called a progression. Ibid. (1827), Course Math., I. 113. But when the difference or ratio of every two succeeding terms is the same quantity, the proportion is said to be Continued, and the numbers themselves make a series of Continued Proportionals, or a progression.
† b. Continued bass (in Music) = THOROUGH-BASS. [It. basso continuo.]
1727–51. Chambers, Cycl., Continued, or thorough-bass, in music, is that which continues to play constantly; both during the recitatives, and to sustain the choir or chorus.
