[f. prec. sb.]
1. trans. To cause a fracture in, esp. a bone, etc.; to break the continuity of; to crack.
[1612–1794. see the ppl. adj.]
1803. M. Cutler, in Life, Jrnls. & Corr. (1888), II. 134. Attempting to stop some cattle back of the Meeting House, I fell upon a large round timber and fractured two ribs; pain extreme.
1830. Lyell, Princ. Geol., I. 132. Before our secondary strata were formed, those of older date … were fractured and contorted.
1858. Lardner, Handbk. Nat. Phil., Hydrost., 7. Where pressures so intense are produced, a liability of bursting or fracturing some parts of the machine might arise.
1859. W. Collins, Q. of Hearts, I. ii. 42. He said she would yawn over the novels, turn up her nose at the piano, and fracture her skull with the pony.
2. intr. for refl. To suffer fracture; to break.
18[?]. Science, IV. No. 16. 5 (Cent. Dict.). The implements … are of sandstone [or] quartzite, neither of which fractures properly when subjected to heat.
Hence Fractured ppl. a.; Fracturing vbl. sb. and ppl. a.
1612. Woodall, The Surgeons Mate, Wks. (1653), 149. Nothing cureth a fractured bone so much as rest.
a. 1763. Shenstone, Economy iii. 38.
| Behold his chair, whose fractur’d seat infirm | |
| An aged cushion hides! |
1794. Sullivan, View Nat., I. 104. What monstrous chasms, which could receive a fractured and sinking country for nine hundred miles in extent!
1830. Herschel, Stud. Nat. Phil., 285. The effects which require for their production the sudden application of convulsive and fracturing efforts.
1834. Mrs. Somerville, Connex. Phys. Sc., xxx. (1849), 350. The part which originally had a north pole acquires a south pole at the fractured end.
1886. A. Winchell, Walks & Talks Geol. Field, 221. Thus the forming crust was alternately uplifted and depressed. Much fracturing of the crust must have resulted.
