[f. as prec. + -NESS.] Froward quality or condition; perversity; untowardness; an instance of this.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 27617. O pride bicums vnbuxumnes, strif and strutt, and frawardnes.
a. 1340. Hampole, Psalter, liv. 22. Dwelland in frawardnes of þaire witt.
c. 1440. Jacob’s Well (E.E.T.S.), 155. Frowardnes comyth fro þe herte, but þe tunge schewyth it out thrugh ouer-thwerte woordys.
c. 1555. Harpsfield, Divorce Hen. VIII. (1878), 222. Now that Sir Thomas Moore’s refusal did not proceed from any such wilfulness, obstinacy, or contempt is evident, as well by that himself was ready to swear to the commissioners that he did it not for any self-will or frowardness but only upon mere conscience, as for that when the commissioners pressed him with obstinacy, saying that he would neither swear nor yet shew the cause that moved him to forbear the oath, he was ready to open the said causes (the King’s license and favour thereto obtained), which could not be granted him.
1576. A. Fleming, A Panoplie of Epistles, 393. The frowardnesse of my fortune.
1647. Clarendon, Hist. Reb., VI. § 21. The pride, frowardness, and perversness of the Rebels.
1712. Berkeley, Pass. Obed., § 42. We should not … shew a frowardness or impatience of those transient sufferings.
a. 1716. South, Serm., II. 78. How many Frowardnesses of ours does he smother, how many Indignities does he pass by.
1775. Burke, Sp. Conc. Amer., Wks. (1808), III. 62. It is nothing but a little sally of anger, like the frowardness of peevish children, who, when they cannot get all they would have, are resolved to take nothing.
1844. W. H. Kelly, trans. L. Blanc’s The History of the Ten Years, 1830–40, I. 179. The dauphin, who possessed that sort of headstrong wilfulness that is common to narrow intellects, withdrew to his apartment, and giving way to one of his occasional fits of boyish frowardness, he dashed his sword on the floor.
