pa. pple. and ppl. a. [pa. pple. of STRIKE v.]
A. pa. pple. in special sense. (For other uses see STRIKE v.) Stricken in years (earlier † stricken on, in age, in elde): advanced in years. arch. (See also STRUCK, STRUCKEN.)
The pple. in these phrases belongs to STRIKE v. in the intransitive sense ‘to go.’ Cf. the equivalent stepped (stape, stopen) in years (STEP v. 4).
c. 1380. Sir Ferumb., 3481. Sirs, ȝe knoweþ wel þat y am sumdel stryken on age.
c. 1400. Sc. Trojan War (Horstm.), 2621. I ame now so strikine in elde, That I þe kynryk may nocht welde.
1535. Coverdale, Gen. xviii. 11. And Abraham and Sara were both olde, & well stryken in age.
1542. Udall, trans. Erasm. Apoph., 37 b. He learned to plaie on the harpe after yt he was well striken in age.
a. 1586. Sidney, Arcadia, I. iii. (1912), 19. He being already well striken in yeares, maried a young princes, named Gynecia.
1662. J. Davies, trans. Olearius’ Voy. Ambass., 133. A man well stricken in years.
1709. Steele, Tatler, No. 98, ¶ 2. Though you are stricken in years, and have had great experience in the world.
1819. Scott, Leg. Montrose, xxiii. A matron somewhat stricken in years.
1839. Lane, Arab. Nts., I. 84. At length there arrived … a great sage, stricken in years, who was called the sage Doobán.
B. ppl. a.
1. Of a deer (occas. of other animals): Wounded in the chase. † Also of a person: Hurt by a pointed instrument.
1513. Douglas, Æneis, IV. ii. 40. Our all the cetie enragit scho … Wandris, as ane strikin hynd.
1540. Palsgr., Acolastus, IV. iii. T j b. I beinge a stryken fysher, waxe wyse .i. whan a fisher man hath hurte his hande with a hoke, [etc.].
1590. Spenser, F. Q., I. ii. 24. A virgin widow, whose deepe wounded mind With loue, long time did languish as the striken hind. Ibid., II. i. 12. That shall I shew (said he) as sure, as hound The stricken Deare doth chalenge by the bleeding wound.
1602. Shaks., Ham., III. ii. 282 (Qo. 1). What, frighted with false fires? Then let the stricken [1604 Qo. 2 strooken; 1623 Fol. strucken] deere goe weepe, The Hart vngalled play.
1784. Cowper, Task, III. 108. I was a stricken deer, that left the herd Long since.
1885. Riverside Nat. Hist. (1888), V. 202. A stricken whale has been known to stay an hour below the surface.
2. Struck with a blow.
1538. Elyot, Dict., Pulsatus, striken as a harpe or other instrument is, whyche hath strynges.
1803. Visct. Strangford, Poems of Camoens (1810), 107. The stricken flint its fires betray’d!
1815. Scott, Waterloo, xx. 24. O! when thou … mark’st the matron’s bursting tears Stream when the stricken drum she hears.
1847. Tennyson, Princess, V. 484. Into fiery splinters leapt the lance, And out of stricken helmets sprang the fire.
1893. S. Gee, Auscult. & Percussion, iii. (ed. 4), 60. A secondary object [in percussion] is to discover the degree of resistance or the density of the stricken spot.
b. Of a sound, musical note: Produced by striking a blow. Stricken hour (arch.): a full hour as indicated by the striking of the clock.
1820. Scott, Monast., x. And without interruption or impatience, to listen for a stricken hour to his narration.
1855. Hawthorne, Eng. Note-Bks. (1870), I. 365. General —— made us a call on his way to the Consulate, and sat talking a stricken hour or thereabouts.
1873. Mrs. Whitney, Other Girls, xxxiv. A sudden stop, in speech as in music, is sometimes more significant than any stricken note.
3. Of a person, community: Afflicted with disease or sickness; overwhelmed with trouble or sorrow, and the like. Of the face: Marked with or exhibiting great trouble.
Frequent in comb., as fever- (1818), panic- (1814), pestilence- (1819), poverty- (1844), sorrow- (1819) stricken: see those words.
[1611. Bible, Isa. liii. 4. Yet we did esteeme him striken, smitten of God, and afflicted.]
1846. Lytton, Lucretia, I. vii. He rather heightened than removed the picture which haunted Mainwaring—Susan, stricken, dying, broken-hearted!
1873. Burton, Hist. Scot., VI. lxx. 209. The generous assistant of the stricken or oppressed.
1875. H. James, Roderick Hudson, xxvi. Roderick’s stricken state had driven him … higher and further than he knew.
1896. Mrs. Caffyn, Quaker Grandmother, 222. The woman shuddered, and shrank away. Presently she lifted up a drawn, stricken face.
1904. Verney Mem., II. xlvii. 269. It should have reached him the summer of the great plague, when there was but little intercourse between the ships and the stricken city [Aleppo].
b. Of the mind, heart, soul: Afflicted with frenzy, madness, grief, or the like.
1795. Southey, Joan of Arc, I. 58. To place her with some pious sisterhood, Who … may likeliest remedy The stricken mind, or frenzied or possess’d.
1845–6. Trench, Huls. Lect., Ser. I. iii. 42. The good Samaritan that bound up the wounds of every stricken heart.
1897. Watts-Dunton, Aylwin, XIII. iii. Those … know little or nothing … of the stricken soul that looks out on man … through the light of an intolerable pain.
c. jocularly. ‘Smitten’ with love. Cf. love-stricken.
1840. Dickens, Old C. Shop, viii. A stricken market-gardener.
4. Of a measure: Having its contents levelled with the brim of the measuring vessel, as distinguished from heaped. Cf. STRIKED ppl. a.
1495. Act 11 Hen. VII., c. 4 § 2. Be it also enacted that ther be but only viij busshelles rased and streken to the quarter of Corne.
1641. Best, Farm. Bks. (Surtees), 103. Wee have allwayes of a stricken bushell of corne, an upheaped bushell of meale.
1778. [W. Marshall], Minutes Agric., 27 Nov. 1775. I have employed an itinerant Chaff-cutter, at 1s. the quarter of sixteen striken-bushels. Ibid., 21 May 1776. Nine cart-horses eat thirty quarters of chaff … about three double quarters (of sixteen bushels equal to stricken measure) a-team a-week.
5. Of a sail: Lowered.
1593. Sidney’s Arcadia, II. (1598), 125. The cunningest mariners were so conquered by the storme, as they thought it best with striken [ed. 1 (1590), reads striking] sailes to yeeld to be gouerned by it.
6. Stricken field (rarely battle): a joined engagement between armed forces or combatants; a pitched battle.
A Sc. use, restored to literary currency by Scott. Cf. the phrases to strike a battle, field s.v. STRIKE v. 34 b.
a. 1700[?]. Old Ballad, in Scott, Waverley, Note 2 E. The Highlandmen are pretty men For handling sword and shield, But yet they are but simple men To stand a stricken field.
1820. Scott, Abbot, xviii. I never had the good fortune to see a stricken field.
1828. Macaulay, Misc. Writ. (1860), I. 252. He was vanquished on fields of stricken battle.
1864. Burton, Scot Abr., I. iii. 134. As if there had been an actual stricken field, with all the able-bodied men on both sides engaged in it.
Hence Strickenly adv., † Strickenness.
1599. A. M., trans. Gabelhouer’s Bk. Physicke, 26/1. A precious water for the strickennes, & fallinge Sicknes…. For strickennes. Take Assesbloode [etc.] … and this with God his ayde will recovere agayne his speeche.
1880. Mrs. C. Reade, Brown Hand & White, I. viii. 192. She marvels, and each succeeding year more strickenly, at the exceeding beauty of the young world.
1881. D. C. Murray, Joseph’s Coat, II. xxv. 268. ‘This is a queer start,’ said the bewildered reader, staring strickenly at Joe.
