[f. BIG a. + -NESS.]
1. Large size or bulk.
1494. Fabyan, V. cxxxi. 114. Most precious stones of a great bygnesse and value.
1509. Hawes, Past. Pleas., XXXVIII. viii. 197. A poynted dyamonde of mervaylous bygnes.
1614. Markham, Cheap Husb., I. i. (1668), 4. Not grosse with much flesh but with the bignesse of his bones.
1827. Hare, Guesses (1859), 381. Bigness with the bulk of mankind is the nearest synonym for greatness.
1878. Tait & Stewart, Unseen Univ., ii. § 85. But we must not be terrified at mere bigness.
b. fig. Haughtiness, pompousness, swagger.
1681. H. More, Exp. Dan., Pref. 57. The worldly bigness and downbearing Dominion of a tyrannical Clergy.
1847. L. Hunt, Men, Women, & Bks., II. i. 15. A puffed and uneasy pomp, a bigness instead of greatness.
2. Size, magnitude, bulk (large or small).
1529. Rastell, Pastyme (1811), 105. They be of one bygnes.
1667. Milton, P. L., II. 1052. This pendant world, in bigness as a Starr.
1779. Johnson, Blake, Wks. IV. 375. Seven forts with cannon proportioned to the bigness.
1826. Kirby & Sp., Entomol., III. xxix. 78. The bigness of a large pea.
