Forms: see prec. 5 pa. pple. eclippid. [f. prec. Cf. Fr. éclipser, late L. eclipsare.]
† 1. intr. To suffer eclipse; to be eclipsed. Obs.
1393. Gower, Conf., II. 153. The sonne and mone eclipsen both.
a. 1593. T. Watson, Poems (Arb.), 206. Thou neuer doest eclips … thy glorie still doth waxe.
1667. Milton, P. L., II. 666. The night-hag … comes … to dance With Lapland witches while the labouring moon Eclipses at their charms.
† b. fig. Obs.
c. 1430. Lydg., Bochas, I. ii. 5 a. God … can … maken princes eclipsen in theyr glory.
1590. Greene, Poems (1861), 296. Starry eyes, whereat my sight Did eclipse with much delight.
2. trans. Of one of the heavenly bodies: To cause an obscuration of some other heavenly body, by passing between it and the spectator, or between it and the source from which it derives its light.
c. 1485. Digby Myst. (1882), iv. 356. The son had lost his sight; Eclippid was hee.
1596. Drayton, Legends, I. 928. The blessed Sunne … Eclips’d to me, eternally appeares.
1726. trans. Gregory’s Astron., I. 34. The Duration of some Eclipses is … so long … as to let the Moon go the Length of three of its Diameters in the Shadow totally eclipsed.
1832. Nat. Philos., II. Introd. Astron., p. lii. (Usef. Knowl. Soc.). When the moon eclipses the sun to us, the earth is eclipsed to the moon.
b. transf. To intercept (light); used techn. with reference to an intermittent light in a lighthouse.
1858. Merc. Mar. Mag., V. 60. It is a White Revolving Light, eclipsed once a minute.
3. fig. To cast a shadow upon, throw into the shade; to obscure, deprive of luster.
1581. R. Goade, in Confer., II. (1584), H iiij b. The glorie of it was … eclipsed.
1650. B., Discolliminium, 30. A toleration of errours eclipsing and accosting Gods Truths.
1662. Dryden, Wild Gallant, Wks. 1725, I. 164. I confess I was a little eclips’d; but I’ll chear up.
1774. J. Bryant, Mythol., II. 525. The ancient name was eclipsed by a later title.
1855. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., III. 351. The splendour of the House of Argyle had been eclipsed.
† b. To hide, screen from. Also, to extinguish (life). Obs.
1591. Shaks., 1 Hen. VI., IV. v. 53. Here I take my leaue of thee … Borne to eclipse thy Life this afternoone.
1642. G. Englisham, Forerunner of Rev., 3. How easily I may eclipse myself from his power to do me harm.
1653. Cloria & Narcissus, I. 243. He was not to be ecclipsed from the eyes of the multitude.
4. To render dim by comparison; to outshine, surpass. Chiefly fig.
1717. Lady M. W. Montague, Lett., II. xliv. 18. Her earrings eclipsed all the rest.
1761. Hume, Hist. Eng., II. xxvii. 127. The Earl of Surrey had totally eclipsed him in favour.
1812. S. Rogers, Columbus, XII. 61. A spark is thrown that shall eclipse the sun.
1831. Brewster, Newton (1855), I. xiii. 381. A discovery which is the glory of one age is eclipsed by the extension of it in another.
1870. Disraeli, Lothair, I. xxxi. 320. One must sing in a room … or the nightingales would eclipse us.
5. † a. To elide or omit (sounds) in pronunciation (obs.). b. In Irish (Gaelic, etc.) Grammar: To change the sound of an initial consonant according to euphonic laws. (In writing, the letter expressing the new sound is prefixed to the original initial which becomes silent.) See ECLIPSIS.
1589. Puttenham, Eng. Poesie, II. xii. (Arb.), 127. If he [a word] goe before another word commencing with a vowell not letting him to be eclipsed, his vtterance is easie and currant.
1602. Carew, Cornwall, 56 a. The English which they speake is good … but they disgrace it … eclipsing (somewhat like the Somersetshire men) specially in pronouncing the names.
