[f. as prec. + -NESS.]
1. Symbolical or figurative quality or manner. arch.
1669. H. More, Seven Churches, ix. 143 (T.). The multifarious Allusivenesse of the Propheticall style.
1875. M. Lower, Engl. Surn. (1875), II. App. 128. The allusiveness so much objected to by the lovers of simple and non-emblematical heraldry.
2. The quality of containing or making covert or indirect reference.
1791. J. Whitaker, Rev. Gibbon, 254 (R.). The quick and short allusiveness of it [Gibbon’s language].
1863. Sat. Rev., 415. Half-jocular allusiveness, which is incomparably more suggestive and more full of temptation than anything else.
1871. R. H. Hutton, Ess., II. 299. The indirectness, the allusiveness, the educated reticence of the artists.
