subs. (colloquial).—Generic for luxury and magnificence. Hence (1) the papal power (formerly identified with the mystical Babylon of the Apocalypse); (2) any large city: spec. London (also MODERN BABYLON). BABYLONIAN = (1) a papist; and (2) an astrologer (Chaldea was the ancient seat of the craft); BABYLONISH = popish.
1564. A Brief Examination, iij. We dwell not among the BABILONIANS and Chaldies.
1590. H. BARROW [Conference, i. 10]. The antichristian yoke of theis BABILONISH Bishopps.
1634. E. RAINBOWE, Labour Forbidden and Commanded (1635), 41. Thy great BABILONS which thou hast built.
c. 1650. BRATHWAITE, Barnaby’s Journal (1723), 61.
| Whores of BABYLON me impalled, | |
| And me their Adonis called. |
1654. GAGE, A clear Vindication of the … Parochial Ministers of England, from the … injurious nickname of BABYLONISH [Title].
1663. BUTLER, Hudibras, I. i. 93.
| A BABYLONISH Dialect, | |
| Which learned Pedents much affect. |
1677. R. GILPIN, Dæmonologia Sacra (1867), 192. For from good bishops … they are become incurable BABYLONIANS.
1795. SOUTHEY, Letters from Spain (1799), 76. Here the BABYLONIAN [= Romish Church] walks the street in full dress scarlet.
1816. GILCHRIST, Philosophic Etymology, 128. This is the kind of BABYLONISH lexicography of Johnson’s Dictionary, which gives twenty-four meanings, or shadows of meaning … to the word from.
1823. BYRON, Don Juan, XI. xxiii. The approach … to mighty BABYLON [London].
