Swinish

a. [f. SWINE sb. + -ISH¹]

  1.  Having the character or disposition of a swine; hoggish, piggish; sensual, gluttonous; coarse, gross, or degraded in nature.

c. 1200.  Trin. Coll. Hom., 37. [They] ben icleped swinisse men & on hem wuneð þe deuel.

1588.  Marprel. Epist. (Arb.), 24. The Lorde B. and your Antichristian swinish rable.

1592.  Nashe, P. Penilesse, Wks. (Grosart), II. 43. I loue the quicke-witted Italians … because they mortally detest this surley swinish Generation.

1606.  S. Gardiner, Bk. Angling, 22. Drunkards, swinish Epicures, heretiques.

1685.  Baxter, Paraphr. N. T., Luke viii. 32. Swinish sinners.

1790.  Burke, Fr. Rev., 117. Learning will be cast into the mire, and trodden down under the hoofs of a swinish multitude.

1829.  Lytton, Disowned, lxvxxiii. The reeking, gaping, swinish crowd.

1829.  Scott, Anne of G., xxiii. ‘The swinish mutineers!’ said Schreckenwald.

1857.  H. S. Brown, Manliness, 2. Far be it from me to say that the multitude is swinish, but certainly there is a swinish multitude.

  b.  Of actions, etc.: Characteristic of or befitting a swine; coarse, degraded, beastly.

1426.  Lydg., De Guil. Pilgr., 3718. He, in hys swynys lawe, Off hys rudnesse bestyal, Ne kan no ferther se at al Toward the hevene.

1563[?].  Veron (title) A Frvtefvl treatise of predestination,… with an apology of the same, against the swynyshe gruntinge of the Epicures and Atheystes of oure time.

1604.  Shaks., Ham., I. iv. 19 (Qo. 2). They clip vs drunkards, and with Swinish phrase Soyle our addition. Ibid. (1605), Macb., I. vii. 67. When in Swinish sleepe, Their drenched Natures lyes.

1613.  Purchas, Pilgrimage, IX. viii. 717. In this swinish education he had not so much as learned to reade.

1694.  F. Bragge, Disc. Parables, xi. 381. Drunkenness, that swinish vice.

1817.  Bentham, Parl. Reform, Wks. 1843, III. 469. Swinish the character, of the vast majority of that vast multitude.

1865.  Dickens, Mut. Fr., III. x. In his worse than swinish state … he was a pretty object for any eyes.

  2.  Pertaining to or fit for swine.

1592.  Breton, C’tess Pembroke’s Love, Wks. (Grosart), I. 22/2. The sweetest wine, is but as swinish wash, Vnto the water, of the well of life.

  3.  Having the nature of a swine; that is a swine; consisting of swine.

1612.  Rowlands, Knaue of Harts (Hunter. Cl.), 27. Directly like the swinish Hogge he liues, That feeds on fruit which from the tree doth fall.

1799.  S. Turner, Anglo-Sax., II. vii. 316. Ina … was amazed to find … a swinish litter on the couch of his repose.

1830.  Carlyle, in For. Rev. & Cont. Misc., V. 10. All sorts of bovine, swinish, and feathered cattle.

1891.  Farrar, Darkn. & Dawn, lxvi. To have its site defiled with swinish offerings and Pagan shrines.

  b.  Resembling a swine or that of a swine, in aspect or other physical quality.

1805.  [S. Weston], Werneria, 13. The swinish smell Most fetid [of swine-stone].

1815.  Ann. Reg., Chron., 17/2. There is hardly a company in which this swinish female [having features like a pig] is not talked of.

1889.  W. Clark Russell, Marooned, xiv. The swinish outline of the porpoise.

  Hence Swinishly adv.; Swinishness.

1545.  Bale, Image Both Ch., I. 39 b. For so muche as thou haste not … bene thankfull vnto God for such an heauenly gift, but rather swynishly troden it vnder thy feete.

1591.  Percivall, Sp. Dict., Porqueria, swinishnes.

1655.  Gurnall, Chr. in Arm., I. iii. (1669), 26/2. The Drunkard has nothing to say for himself, when you ask him why he lives so swinishly.

c. 1775.  J. Rutty, in Boswell, Johnson (1848), 551/2. [Johnson laughed heartily … at his mentioning, with such a serious regret, occasional instances of] swinishness in eating.

a. 1868.  in Farrar, Seekers (1875), 333. It stands out in noble contrast to the swinishness of the Campanian villas.