a. (sb.) and adv. Forms: 3 Orm. laȝhesst, 4 lauest, louwest, 5 lagh-, lau-, law-, lowist, -yst, 5–6 lawest, Sc. -ast, 6 Sc. leuchest, 3– lowest. [f. LOW a. + -EST.]
A. adj. 1. The superlative of LOW a. in its various senses.
c. 1200. Ormin, 15276. Þiss follc iss laȝhesst.
1297. R. Glouc. (Rolls), 2437. Þe mone lowest is.
a. 1300–1400. Cursor M., 357 (Gött.). Þe lauest [Cott. neþermast] þan es water and erde.
1362. Langl., P. Pl., A. I. 115. Lucifer louwest liȝth of hem alle.
1435. Misyn, Fire of Love, I. iv. 8. Slyke soþly ar moste haly, & ȝit of men ar haldyn laghyst.
a. 1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. V., 33 b. The lowest sorte of the vile and rusticall people.
a. 1578. Lindesay (Pitscottie), Chron. Scot. (S. T. S.), II. 89. I sall mak … the hiest stone the leuchest.
1602. Shaks., Ham., III. ii. 383. You would sound mee from my lowest Note to the top of my Compasse.
1681. Flavel, Right Man’s Refuge, 179. When things have been brought to the lowest ebb.
1780. Cowper, Table-T., 419. Perjury … Sells oaths by tale and at the lowest price.
1860. Tyndall, Glac., II. iii. 247. The lowest atmospheric strata.
1862. Building News, 23 May, 1/2. The Board do not bind themselves to accept the lowest or any Tender.
1900. J. G. Frazer, Pausanias, etc., 46. The lowest fetish-worshippers of Western Africa.
b. In partitive concord: The lowest part of. poet.
1596. Spenser, F. Q., V. v. 2. But, when she list, it raught Downe to her lowest heele.
1611. Bible, Ps. lxxxvi. 13. For great is thy mercy toward me: and thou hast deliuered my soule from the lowest hell.
1667. Milton, P. L., II. 882. That the lowest bottom shook Of Erebus.
2. Comb. Forming superlatives to the combinations of LOW a.
a. 1640. Earl Stirling, Anacrisis, in Wks. of Drumm. of Hawth. (1711), 160. In a more abject manner than the lowest minded man could have descended to conceive.
B. absol. or as sb. 1. The lowest part, position or pitch. Obs. exc. with at.
a. 1225. St. Marher., 14. Þe engles … þe seoð ham lihten swa lah of so swiðe heh, from þe heste in heouene to þe laheste in helle.
1388. Wyclif, Matt. xxvii. 51. And lo! the veil of the temple was to-rent in twey parties, fro the hiest to the lowest.
c. 1450. trans. De Imitatione, II. x. 53. Put þe euer atte lowist, and þe hyest shal be ȝoven to þe; for þe hiest may not stonde wiþoute þe lowist.
1640. trans. Verdere’s Rom. of Rom., III. xxxvii. 156. When a man thinks them at the lowest of the wheele, hee shall be sure to find them on the top.
1659. Hammond, On Ps. cvii. 39–41 Paraphr. 546. Just when they are brought to the lowest.
1860. Mill, Repr. Govt. (1865), 140/1. Men who had been brought up to their duties, and had fulfilled them for many years, at lowest without disgrace.
1897. C. Headlam, Sel. Brit. Satirists, 64. When taste was almost at its lowest in England.
2. He who or that which is lowest.
1785. Cowper, Task, IV. 588. The rich, and they that have an arm to check The licence of the lowest in degree.
1830. R. Hardie, Hoyle made Familiar, 62. [Cassino.] When three persons play … the two lowest subtract their points from the highest.
1843. Pusey, Serm. Holy Euch., 15. Lowest is joined on with highest, earth with heaven … man with God.
C. adv. The superlative of LOW adv. in its various senses; also in Comb.
1390. Gower, Conf., I. 65. Whanne he berth lowest the Seil, Thanne is he swiftest to beguile The womman.
1759. Hume, Hist. Eng. (1834), III. xxiii. 231. The period in which the people of Christendom were the lowest sunk in ignorance.
1834. Tait’s Mag., I. 725/1. In 1799 the salary of our lowest-paid Judges was £1000.
