a. and adv. in combination.
1. adverbial and parasynthetic, as bitter-biting (biting bitterly), bitter-blessed, -hearted, -heartedness, -pungent, -rinded, -tasted, -well.
1749. Fielding, Tom Jones, IV. ii. *Bitter-biting Eurus.
1786. Burns, Daisy, iii. The *bitter-biting north.
1848. Kingsley, Saint’s Trag., II. xi. 135. The day I found the *bitter-blessed cross.
1775. Adair, Amer. Ind., 277. *Bitter-hearted foes. Ibid., 43. Their word, which expresses ‘sharp,’ conveys the idea of *bitter-heartedness.
1884. Browning, Ferishtah, 3. Sage-leaf is *bitter-pungent.
1831. Carlyle, Sart. Res., II. ii. 107. A prickly, *bitter-rinded stone-fruit.
1850. Mrs. Browning, Poems, II. 71. He laughed out *bitter-well.
2. (adj.) In many names of plants and other productions, some merely denoting a particular bitter variety of that to which the name is properly given, bitter almond, bitter bay, bitter beer, bitter oak; in others specifying a distinct plant or substance, as bitter-apple (= bitter-gourd); bitter-ash, a West Indian tree, Simaruba excelsa; bitter-blain, a name given by the Dutch Creoles in Guiana to Vandellia diffusa (Treas. Bot.); bitter-cress, a book-name for the genus Cardamine, and esp. the species C. amara; bitter-cup, a cup made of quassia wood to impart some of its bitter principle to water poured into it; bitter-cucumber or bitter-gourd, the Colocynth (Citrullus Colocynthus), a plant of the gourd family, which furnishes a well-known cathartic drug; bitter-damson, a West Indian tree, Simaruba amara; bitter earth, magnesia; bitter-fitch (= bitter-vetch); bitter herb, the British plant Erythræa Centaurium; bitter-king, a tree, Soulamea amara, of the Eastern Archipelago, excessively bitter in all its parts; bitter-nut, the Swamp Hickory, Carya amara, of North America; † bitter-salt, obs. name of Epsom salts; bitter-spar, a mineral, a variety of dolomite; BITTER-SWEET, q.v.; bitter-vetch, a book-name for species of Lathyrus and Vicia formerly Orobus; † bitter-weed, obs. name of species of poplar, also, a N. American species of wormwood; bitter-wood, the timber of a tropical American genus of trees Xylopia, or the trees themselves; bitter-wort, species of gentian, esp. the Fell-wort (G. amarella).
1632. Massinger, City Madam, IV. ii. Quite forget their powders And *bitter almonds.
1865. Morn. Star, 23 June. He gave the bearer half an ounce of powdered colocynth commonly called *bitter-apple.
1755. Smollett, Quix. (1803), I. 98. Crowned with garlands of cypress and *bitter-bay.
1871. M. Collins, Mrq. & Merch., I. vi. 161. I supped on … cold beef and *bitter beer.
1876. Harley, Mat. Med., 675. *Bitter cups turned out of the wood are used as a ready means of furnishing the infusion.
1551. Turner, Herbal, P iv a. *Bitter fitches, or bitter tares.
1585. Lloyd, Treas. Health, G iv. Decoctyon of Lichepeasen or *bitterfitch.
1755. Gentl. Mag., XXV. 408. If we plant cucumbers … near the *bitter-gourd, the fruits of the first will be as bitter as gall.
1843. Portlock, Geol., 214. *Bitter spar, or Brown spar, occurs in small but well-defined crystals.
1661. Lovell, Hist. Anim. & Min., 44. The simples are Vineger, Betony … *bitter vetch with Wine.
1878. in Britten & Holland, Plant-n., 45. Fir, saugh, and *bitterweed.
1597. Gerard, Herbal, c. § 4. 352. Named in English Felwoort Gentian; *Bitterwoort; Baldmoyne, and Baldmoney.
