a. [UN-1 7.]
† 1. Unreasonable. Obs.
c. 1370. Lay Folks’ Catech. (L.), 1342. Glotony … is an vnskylful lykyng or loue in tast or tastynge of mete or drynke.
1377. Langl., P. Pl., B. XIII. 277. Of vnboxome speche,… of scoffyng and of vnskilful berynge.
c. 1400. Pilgr. Sowle (Caxton), I. xxx. (1859), 34. They shold serue theyr creatour … with resonable werkes doyng, and vnskylful werkes forbering.
c. 1491. Chast. Goddes Chyld. (Caxton), 25. Her rest was full short by cause it was unskilfull and also unlefull.
† b. Undiscerning; unwise, foolish. Obs. rare.
c. 1374. Chaucer, Troylus, I. 790. I may not endure þat þow dwelle In so vnskilful [v.r. onskylful] an opynyoun.
c. 1449. Pecock, Repr., III. xix. 413. But that this seiyng is vnskilful may be schewid thus.
1568. Grafton, Chron., II. 30. Robert Losaunge that … by the gift of a thousand pound to the King, was made Bishop of Thetforde, repented him after, and bewayled that vnskilfull deede.
† 2. a. Ignorant of propriety. Obs.–1
c. 1475. Rauf Coilȝear, 159. Schir, thow art vnskilfull,… Thow byrd to haue nurtour aneuch, and thow hes nane.
† b. Ignorant of something. Also with inf. or dependent clause. Obs.
a. 1547. Surrey, Æneis, II. 493. Striken with dred, vnskilfull of the place.
1573. Tusser, Husb. (1878), 106. I’ll huswife vnskilful to make hir owne chees.
1600. Holland, Livy, XXII. xxxi. 451. They fell unadvisedly into an ambush, and being unskilfull of the countrie,… they were soon enclosed among many.
1667. Milton, P. L., XI. 32. Unskilful with what words to pray, let mee Interpret for him.
3. Lacking in skill; inexpert.
1565. Golding, Cæsar, 32. The whyche pollicie, though it hadde taken place agaynst sauage and vnskylfull people, yet was not Ariouistus so folysh to loke that it should preuaile against oure army too.
1573. Tusser, Husb. (1878), 15. The father an vnthrift, what hope to the sonne? The ruler vnskilfull, how quickly vndonne?
1617. Moryson, Itin., II. 49. At his first entering the gouernment, when he was yet vnskilfull in the affaires of that State.
1639. in Verney Mem. (1907), I. 183. Ther was never soe Rawe, soe unskilfull and soe unwilling an Army brought to fight.
1709. Berkeley, Th. Vision, § 12. Those unskilful in optics.
1765. Museum Rust., IV. 460. This operation is nice, and may prove dangerous in unskilful hands.
1840. Thackeray, Shabby-genteel Story, vi. He was not unskilful at this kind of exercise.
1867. M. E. G. Duff, in N. Brit. Rev., XLVII. 484. The attempts of the foreign evangelizers may often be unskilful enough.
absol. 1565. Cooper, Thesaurus, Imperitum vulgus, the ignorant, rude, or vnskilfull.
c. 1580. [see VOID v. 11].
1612. B. Jonson, Alch., To Rdr. It is onely the disease of the vnskilfull to thinke rude things greater then polish’d.
1726. Leoni, Alberti’s Archit., III. 12 b. It hardly happens … that what delights the Judges, shou’d at the same time strike the Unskilful.
1762. Falconer, Shipwr., II. 251. The gallant boatswain … Prompt to direct the unskilful still appears.
transf. 1687. P. Ayres, To Dryden, 15. Could my unskilful pen augment his fame.
b. Displaying lack of skill; clumsy.
a. 1586. Sidney, Arcadia, I. ix. No more … then … the diligent Pilot in a daungerous tempest doth attend the unskilful words of a passinger.
1614. Latham, Falconry, II. vii. 94. Such Hawkes haue beene euelly ordered, and continued in vncleane and vnskilfull keeping.
1651. Hobbes, Leviath., III. xxxii. 195. When it seemeth so, the fault is either in our unskilfull Interpretation, or erroneous Ratiocination.
1737. Glover, Leonidas, III. 250. Assyria’s sons Their brazen helms display, th’ unskilful work Of rude Barbarians.
1798. Lamb, R. Gray, xiii. His wounds by unskilful treatment had been brought to a dangerous crisis.
1831. G. P. R. James, Phil. Augustus, I. vii. De Coucy … took the instrument, over the strings of which he threw his hand, in a bold but not unskilful manner.
