zephyrous, adj.

zephyrous
http://www.oed.com/dictionary/zephyrous_adj%3Ftab%3Dmeaning_and_use
Revised 2018

# zephyrousadjective

## Factsheet

### What does the adjective zephyrous mean?

There is one meaning in OED's entry for the adjective zephyrous. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence.

### How common is the adjective zephyrous?

Fewer than 0.01occurrences per million words in modern written English

1850 | 0.0005
1860 | 0.0005
1870 | 0.0005
1880 | 0.0007
1890 | 0.0006
1900 | 0.0008
1910 | 0.0009
1920 | 0.001
1930 | 0.0009
1940 | 0.0009
1950 | 0.0007
1960 | 0.0007
1970 | 0.0006
1980 | 0.0004
1990 | 0.0004
2000 | 0.0004
2010 | 0.0004

### Where does the adjective zephyrous come from?

Earliest known use

mid 1700s

The earliest known use of the adjective zephyrous is in the mid 1700s.

OED's earliest evidence for zephyrous is from before 1750, in the writing of Aaron Hill, writer and entrepreneur.

### Nearby entries

1. zephyrean, adj. 1793–
2. zephyret, n. 1777–1881
3. zephyr flower, n.?1829–
4. zephyr-gale, n. 1596–1901
5. zephyrian, adj. 1661–
6. zephyrine, adj. & n. 1819–
7. zephyring, adj. 1821–
8. zephyrless, adj. a1821–
9. zephyr-like, adv. & adj. 1765–
10. zephyr lily, n.?1877–
11. zephyrous, adj.a1750–
12. zephyry, adj. 1791–
13. Zepp, n. 1914–
14. Zepp, v. 1914–
15. Zeppelin, n. 1896–
16. zeppelin, v. 1910–
17. Zeppelined, adj. 1915–
18. Zeppelining, n. 1915–
19. Zeppelinist, n. 1912–
20. Zeppelinistic, adj. 1930–
21. Zeppelinite, n. 1909–

## Meaning & use

1. a1750–
   Of, relating to, or reminiscent of, a zephyr or light breeze; cf. zephyrean adj., zephyrian adj.
   Stressed as ˈzephyrous.
   1. a1750

      > Hither no winds, but zephyrous breaths repair.

      A. Hill, Works (1753) vol. I. 345
   2. 1906

      > It was delicately tentative in tone; a zephyrous intimation, one might say, and hardly more.

      Lippincott's Monthly Magazine June 696
   3. 2015

      > I climb..to the top to be rewarded with a stupendous view: sapphirine sea, gin-clear sky, beaming sun and my face kissed by a zephyrous breeze.

      Sunday Times (Nexis) 24 (Travel section) 19
   weather
   1. light a1398–
      Of wind, a breeze, etc.: gentle, not strong in force. Cf. moderate, adj. A.1b, strong, adj. 13a.
   2. plain a1425–35
      figurative. Of the wind: calm, gentle. Obsolete.
   3. small 1542–
      Of a wind: light, slight, gentle.
   4. soft-footed 1603–
      Having a soft or light tread. poetic. Used figuratively of the passage of time or the movement of incorporeal or ethereal things.
   5. supple 1648–
      literary. Of a wind: blowing gently, light and soft.
   6. favonian 1656–
      Of or pertaining to the west wind; hence, favourable, gentle, propitious.
   7. zephyrian 1661–
      Of, relating to, or reminiscent of, a zephyr or light breeze; cf. zephyrean, adj.
   8. slack 1670–
      Of wind, or tide: Blowing, or running, with very little strength or speed.
   9. zephyrous a1750–
      Of, relating to, or reminiscent of, a zephyr or light breeze; cf. zephyrean, adj., zephyrian, adj.
   10. zephyry 1791–
       Of the nature of a zephyr or light breeze; characterized by or affected by zephyrs.
   11. zephyrean 1793–
       Of the nature of, or reminiscent of, a zephyr or light breeze; cf. zephyrian, adj.
   View in Historical Thesaurus

## Frequency

zephyrous typically occurs fewer than 0.01 times per million words in modern written English.

zephyrous is in frequency band 1, which contains words occurring fewer than 0.001 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands

Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.

### Frequency of zephyrous, adj., 1850–2010

* Occurrences per million words in written English

Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.

The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.

For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.

Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.

Decade | Frequency per million words
--- | ---
1850 | 0.0005
1860 | 0.0005
1870 | 0.0005
1880 | 0.0007
1890 | 0.0006
1900 | 0.0008
1910 | 0.0009
1920 | 0.001
1930 | 0.0009
1940 | 0.0009
1950 | 0.0007
1960 | 0.0007
1970 | 0.0006
1980 | 0.0004
1990 | 0.0004
2000 | 0.0004
2010 | 0.0004

Originally published as part of the entry for zephyr, n.

zephyr, n. was revised in June 2018.