a. (adv.) [-LESS.]
1. That is out of its proper time; untimely; unseasonable, ill-timed; esp. occurring or done prematurely. Chiefly poet., now arch. or Obs.
c. 1560. Trag. Rich. II. (1870), 96. Wert thou aliue to see How Ile reuenge thy tymless tragedye On all ther heads.
1590. Marlowe, 2nd Pt. Tamburl., V. iii. ad fin. Let earth and heaven his timeless death deplore.
c. 1611. Chapman, Iliad, VI. 349. Wretched man! So timeless is thy spite That ’tis not honest.
1621. Lady M. Wroth, Urania, 40. A timelesse, and vnseasonable birth.
1751. Falconer, To Pr. of Wales, 78. Well mayst thou mourn thy patriot’s timeless end!
1850. Dobell, Roman, iii. Cease these timeless babblings.
b. as adv. = TIMELESSLY a.
1586. Kyd, Answ. Tychborne’s Lament., iii. Wks. (1901), 341. Thy glorie and thy glasse are timeles runne.
1631. Chapman, Cæsar & Pompey, II. iv. 152. And ’tis their repaire That timelesse darken thus the gloomy ayre.
1876. Swinburne, Erechtheus, 256. To slay thee timeless with my proper tongue.
2. Not subject to time; not affected by the lapse of time; existing or operating without reference to duration; eternal. Chiefly poet. and rhet.
a. 1628. F. Grevil, Hum. Learn., xcvi. Curious mystery Of timelesse time.
1678. Cudworth, Intell. Syst., I. v. § 21. 781. The reason why we cannot frame a Conception of such a timeless Eternity.
1742. Young, Nt. Th., ii. 222. When worlds … headlong rush To timeless night, and chaos, whence they rose.
1819. Blackw. Mag., V. 323. There timeless, spaceless, dwells the Eternal One.
1871. R. Ellis, Catullus, ci. 10. Yea, take, brother, a long Ave, a timeless adieu.
b. absolutely. Cf. ETERNAL B.
1825. Coleridge, Aids Refl. (1848), I. 22. All the truths, acts, and duties, that have an especial reference to the timeless, the permanent, the eternal.
1892. Tennyson, Akbar’s Dream, Hymn, ii. Kneel adoring Him the Timeless in the flame that measures Time!
3. † a. Of no duration; brief, short-lived. Obs. rare–1 b. Destitute or ignorant of musical time. c. Having reference to no particular time.
1657. Cokaine, Obstinate Lady, Poems (1669), 339. Thy timeless inexperience doth deceive thee.
1821. Byron, Juan, IV. lxxxvii. An ignorant, noteless, timeless, tuneless fellow.
1837. G. Phillips, Syriac Gram., 112. The participle is timeless; i. e. it has no time of its own; but partakes of every time with which it may be connected.
