Fortalice

Forms: 5 fortalys, -alyce, fortilitie, 6 fortilesse, fortilage, fortelleze. fortelace, 7, 9 fortiless, 9 -alise, 6– fortalice. [The surviving form, which is also the earliest recorded, is ad. med.L. fortalitia, fortalitium, a derivative of fortis strong; cf. Pr., Sp., Pg. fortaleza, It. fortalizio, fortilizio, OF. fortelesce (cf. the parallel formation forteresce FORTRESS). Some of the obsolete forms are from Fr. or other Romanic langs.]

  In early use = FORTRESS; by mod. writers chiefly used for: ‘A small outwork of a fortification’ (W.); a small fort.

c. 1425.  Wyntoun, Cron., VIII. xxix. 31.

1494.  Act 11 Hen. VII., c. 18. Any Person … being in his Service within his Towns and Fortilities of Berwick and Carlyle.

1560.  Rolland, The Court of Venus, II. 847. With stark draw brig, weil forcit with fortalice.

1590.  Spenser, F. Q., II. xii. 43. Nought feard their force, that fortilage to win.

1642.  Prynne, Sov. Antidote, 24. Castles, Fortresses, Fortilesses.

1754.  Erskine, Princ. Sc. Law (1809), 181. In this class of things, our forefathers reckoned fortalices, or small places of strength, originally built for the defence of the country.

1816.  Scott, Old Mort., xi. The fortalice, thus commanding both bridge and pass, had been, in times of war, a post of considerable importance.

1870.  G. T. Robinson, in Echo, 9 Nov. We canter off to the as yet unfinished fortalice of des Bordes to see the maiden effort of a new piece of 24 which they have just got into position there.

  transf. and fig.  1826.  Scott, Woodst., xxii. This makes Understanding bar himself up within his fortalise, and Wit betake himself to his high tower.

1830.  Marryat, King’s Own, xxxiii. Seymour and Jerry descended from their little fortalice aloft.

1884.  Mag. of Art, VII. Jan., 102/2. The driver, in oriental costume, is seated on the creature’s [an elephant’s] neck, and in the circular fortalice on its back are troopers with buff coats, bandoliers, and matchlocks, and a cannon fronting directly over the driver’s head.

1887.  Ruskin, Præterita, II. xi. 392–3. Brezon, a majestic, but unterrific, fortalice of cliff, forest, and meadow, with unseen nests of village, and unexpected balm and honey of garden and orchard nursed in its recesses.