Forms: see TOUGH a. [f. TOUGH a. + -NESS.] The state or quality of being tough, in various senses of the adjective.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 498/2. Towghenesse (K., A. townesse, P. toughnes), tenacitas.
1573–80. Baret, Alv., T 307. Lentor, toughnesse: a clammie, or gluish humour.
1597. A. M., trans. Guillemeau’s Fr. Chirurg., 48 b/2. The great toughenes of the … Pituita.
1613. Fletcher, etc., Honest Man’s Fort., V. ii. Stock fish…, If it be well drest, for the tuffness sake.
1674. Grew, Veget. Trunks, vii. § 12. Hence likewise we may understand the Cause of the Toughness of Flax.
1732. Arbuthnot, Aliments, etc. (1736), 422. The Viscosity or Toughness of the Fluids.
1733. W. Ellis, Chiltern & Vale Farm., 9. Red Clays … stand in the front … for … Tuffness, Coldness, and Moistness.
1830. Herschel, Stud. Nat. Phil., III. i. (1851), 238. The toughness of a solid, or that quality by which it will endure heavy blows without breaking.
1845. J. Coulter, Adv. in Pacific, xi. 141. From its extreme toughness, we could not eat it.
1862. H. Spencer, First Princ., II. iii. § 56. 199. Add that the increase of density and toughness, going on throughout the tissues in general during life, may be regarded as the formation of a more highly integrated substance.
1895. R. P. Herrick, in Boston (U.S.) Pilgr. Missionary, June, 11/1. You have gained a very good idea of the toughness of these mining towns.
