[f. STUNT a. + -NESS.]

1

  † 1.  Foolishness, stupidity. Obs.

2

c. 1000.  Ælfric, Saints’ Lives, i. 228. Þysses middan-eardes wysdom is stuntnis [L. stultitia] ætforan gode. Ibid., xvii. 23. Se rihtwisa soðlice ne þearf him ondrædan … ʓif he him sylfum styrð fram eallum stunt-nyssum.

3

c. 1175.  Lamb. Hom., 117. Fela stuntnesse beoð, þer nan steore ne bið.

4

  2.  Abrupt brevity.

5

1871.  J. Earle, Philol. Eng. Tongue, x. 497. Short sentences are prevalent in our language, as long ones are in German. In all things we incline to curtness and stuntness.

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