a. [-LESS.]
1. Destitute of stars or starlight; having no stars visible.
1390. Gower, Conf., III. 119. This Bole is ek with sterres set, Thurgh whiche he hath hise hornes knet Unto the tail of Aries, So is he noght ther sterreles.
1638. Cowley, Love’s Riddle, I. Though I were blacker then a starlesse night.
1667. Milton, P. L., III. 425. Dark, waste, and wild, under the frown of Night Starless expos’d.
1728. Mallet, Excursion, I. 288. Night by Night, beneath the starless Dusk.
1818. Byron, Mazeppa, v. With starless skies my canopy.
1877. ‘Rita,’ Vivienne, III. ix. The sky was black and starless.
2. In nonce-uses. a. Having no star or badge of honor on the breast. b. Not made into a star, having no star named after oneself. c. Not born under a good or favorable star, luckless.
1814. Byron, Frag. Ep. T. Moore. The Czar … wore but a starless blue coat.
1853. D. Jerrold, Chron. Clovernook, Wks. 1864, IV. 403. Bacchus,… with all his great bounty, is starless and unhonoured.
1873. Dixon, Two Queens, I. Pref. Two crowned and starless women.
Hence Starlessly adv., Starlessness.
1842. Tait’s Mag., IX. 726. Night sternly and starlessly appears.
1888. Meredith, Poems, Hard Weather, 103. Nor in her starlessness of night Peruse her with the craven nerve.
