soothfast en · ADJ
Etymology
From Middle English sothfast, from Old English sōþfæst (“true, trustworthy”), from Proto-West Germanic *sanþafast. Equivalent to sooth + fast.
Meanings
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(archaic) Actual; real.
So she brought him the China bowl saying in herself, “I shall know what to do when I find out if the words of my child concerning these jewels be soothfast or not”; […]
2012, original 1885, Sir Richard Burton, The Arabian Nights:“I'll take your word for it,” said he, with another glance at a very soothfast mask that came down on as sweet a pair of lips as ever man took craving for.
2022, Neil Munro, Brian D. Osborne, Ronald Armstrong, That Vital Spark, page 182:But her brother has taken and joined their hands, And so soothfast was the kiss — So dear love's due to her lips so true — She had like to have died of bliss; […]
2009, J. P. MacLean, A History of the Clan MacLean, page 452:And hereby mayest thou see and learn, that there is no soothfast security, nor yet no true rest in this life.
2022, Evelyn Underhill, The Cloud of Unknowing:
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(archaic) Based on the truth, true; faithful; honest, veracious
Why do not you […] bear leal and soothfast evidence in her behalf, as ye may with a clear conscience?
1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company, →OCLC:The "soothfast" souls adore true gods; […]
2020, George Gordon Byron, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Christopher Marlowe, Harvard on the Beach:"O mother mine, verily this Shaykh is soothfast and no liar: for the first time he but tried me and now he proposeth to perform his promise."
1887, Richard F[rancis] Burton, transl. and editor, Supplemental Nights to the Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night […], Shammar edition, volume III, [London]: […] Burton Club […], →OCLC, page 10:But he said to her, “Nay, mother mine, indeed he is soothfast and lieth not; for that, in the first of his dealing, he tried me and now his intent is to accomplish unto me his promise.”
2015, Richard Francis Burton, John Payne, Andrew Lang, One Thousand and One Nights:
Deriveds
Translations (2)
fi todenmukainen (based on the truth) · fi todellinen (based on the truth)