adv. Also poet. soe’er. [See SO adv. and EVER adv. 8 e.]

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  † 1.  Whenever. Obs.–1

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1517.  Torkington, Pilgr. (1884), 27. And so ever ony Sarazin comyth by that Sepulcre he cast a stonne ther att.

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  2.  Used with generalizing or emphatic force after words or phrases preceded by how, what, which, whose, etc. (Cf. HOWSOEVER, etc.)

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1557.  North, trans. Gueuara’s Diall Pr., IV. xix. (1568), 170. How great a frend … so euer hee bee to them.

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1580.  Campion, in Allen, Martyrdom (1908), 23. The feare of what punishment temporal soever.

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1595.  Shaks., John, IV. iii. 91. Whose tongue so ere speakes false.

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1610.  Holland, Camden’s Brit. (1637), 569. How great, or how faire soever it hath been.

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1671.  Milton, Samson, 1015. Which way soever men refer it.

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1701.  Swift, Contests Nobles & Comm., v. I conceive it, far below the Dignity … of human Nature … to be engaged in any Party, the most plausible soever, upon such servile Conditions.

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1779.  Mirror, No. 24. 93. What pencil, how animated soever, can equal the glories of the sky at sunset?

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1835.  J. H. Newman, Par. Serm. (1837), I. 267. To all who are perplexed in any way soever.

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1885.  R. Bridges, Eros & Psyche, Aug. xxvii. By which law all things soe’er Are … held.

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