[f. prec., or on analogy of vbs. so formed.]
1. To unite or fasten as with glue; to glue, to cement.
1586. Bright, Melancholy, xiii. 69. Sundrye actions being performed, as to attract … to agglutinate, &c.
1599. A. M., trans. Gabelhouer’s Bk. Physic, 22/1. Agglutinate the same, so close that noe ayre can passe through.
1797. Pearson, in Phil. Trans., LXXXVIII. 33. I could just agglutinate the powder into one mass.
1863. Lyell, Antiq. Man, App. 534. Conglomerates, in which shells or casts of them are agglutinated together with sand and pebbles.
2. Phys. To cause to adhere. In an obs. sense, To add as new material repairing waste of tissue.
1620. Venner, Via Recta, v. 83. Egges … speedily and purely nourish … because of an aptnesse that they have in their substance to be assimilated, and agglutinated to the parts of the body.
1712. trans. Pomet’s Hist. Drugs, I. 199. Moreover Sarcocol agglutinates Flesh.
1743. trans. Heister’s Surg., 17. To agglutinate and heal wounds.
1836. Todd, Cycl. Anat. & Phys., I. 513/2. [Lymph] by agglutinating together the fibres and layers causes the hardness which is so perceptible on pressing the diseased part.
3. To combine simple words so as to express compound ideas; to compound.
1830. Coleridge, Table Talk (1851), 67. The Ober-Deutsch was fuller and fonder of agglutinating words together.
4. trans. and intr. To turn into glue.
1869. in Eng. Mech., 30 July, 412/1. Alcohol … agglutinates copal. Ibid. Shellac, elemi, and mastic agglutinate [in boiling water].
