Dictionary

sweetful en · ADJ

Etymology

From sweet + -ful.

Meanings

1. (uncommon) Characterised by sweetness; delightful; charming.
   • This sweetful day will all be lost[…]Come lovley Jenny haste away / Quickly come make no delay / Come & view these sweetful flowers / Nurs’d by Aprils softest showers / Haste & greet their happy shade / Soon they’l wither soon they’l fade / Then haste my dearest haste away / Come & taste the sweets of May 1804–1822, John Clare, The Early Poems of John Clare, 1804–1822, Oxford: Clarendon Press, published 1989, →ISBN, pages 72 and 461:
   • Sung with a sweetful and unbridled innocence, the songs on Emmylou Harris’ latest LP reflect the country singer’s enduring qualities in a way that pacifies. 1979 June 13, Robert Santelli, “Record Previews”, in Asbury Park Press, one-hundredth year, number 139, Asbury Park, N.J., page B7:
   • I’d love to banter heart to heart and slowly feast on words from honest streams, but hunger’s king or else we’d simply starve in each other’s slowly weakening arms… retelling our dreams of love. And what a sweetful death that’d dearly be. 2013, Douglas Stockwell, The Coin, the Sword, and Open Book, →ISBN, act I, scene 4B, page 39:
   • I sā! yow are feer, my beloved; ah, and sweetful; likeways, our bed is green.[…]Yar lips air liken onto a trid o’ scarlet, and yar spache is sweetful: yar timples air liken onto a bit o’ pomegranate ’ithin yar locks. [1860?], Edward Gillett, The Song of Solomon in the Norfolk Dialect. From the Authorised English Version., Strangeways & Walden, pages 6 (chapter I) and 10 (chapter IV):
   • Of sweetful tones would you deprive the lute?[…]The seasons meet her on this sweetful land, / Persuasion crowns her on this Paphian strand; 1844, Agnostos [pseudonym; Sydney Whiting], edited by Douglas [William] Jerrold, The Illuminated Magazine, volume III (May to October), London: […] the Proprietors, […], pages 70 (A Defence for Poets) and 231 (The Birth of Venus):
   • God be praised for the storms of life, for they make, by the contrast, the rest which is coming more sweetful and more beautiful. 1886 December 25, Henry Blount, “Mirrorings”, in The Weekly Herald, volume V, number 29, Smithfield, N.C.:
   • Her sweetful voice that laughed so clear, / And her own nameless, winsome way, / The simple dress she loved to wear, / Eyes that but looked, and I drawn near— / Now closed in Night for aye! 1856, Hope Witgold, “Lost, Strayed, Stolen,—Dead!”, in The Train: A First-class Magazine, volume III, London: S. O. Beeton, […], page 110:
   • No Friend attending, ſave the warbling Bird / Of Night, which kindly tun’d her melancholy Song / With ſweetful Mone, in Pity to her Fate. 1739, [Anthony Brown], The Fatal Retirement. A Tragedy. As It Was Intended to Have Been Acted at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane, by His Majesty’s Servants. To the Impartial Reader., London: […] T. Osborn […], page 5:
   • When Pierre boards the ship, Nguyen smiles // as if he invented ice cream, / French Vanilla, and Pierre can / taste how sweetful it is to win 1975–2020, Catharine Savage Brosman, quoting “Viet Minh Cold Boys” by David Chapman Berry Jr., Mississippi Poets: A Literary Guide, University Press of Mississippi, published 2020, →ISBN:
   • They had sat by the sea-shore many evenings, and the murmuring of the waters lulled their spirits into the / Calmness of a / Sweetful repose, / A nepenthe of rest, / And in that calmness, so / Placid, pure and sweet, / Came visions, dreams and thrills / Of the happiness and bliss / That was to be! 1885 June 6, “The Soldier and Lenore”, in The Kearney County Advocate, volume I, number 3, Lakin, Kan.:
   • For Maſter Billy Thrumm being juſt out of his Time, his Mamma was reſolved to have a Rout to celebrate his Freedom; and her Spouſe, Mr. Churchwarden, dealing in Rabbit Skins, and the Warehouſe at that Time being empty, ſhe inſiſted upon having the Card-tables ſpread there; becauſe, ſhe ſaid, it was a ſweetfuller Place, than where Madam Hipſhott the Overſeer’s Wife kept her’s; 1761, George Alexander Stevens, chapter V, in Tom Fool’s History: or Modern Taste Displayed, the second edition, volume I, London: […] T. Waller, […], page 21:
   • Vnder a Popler Themis did repoſe her, / And from a brier a ſweetfull branch did plucke:[…] 1589, Thomas Lodge, “The most pithie and pleasant Historie of Glaucus and Silla”, in Scillaes Metamorphosis: Enterlaced with the Vnfortunate Loue of Glaucus, VVhereunto Is Annexed the Delectable Discourse of the Discontented Satyre: with Sundrie Other Most Absolute Poems and Sonnets. Contayning the Detestable Tyrannie of Disdaine, and Comicall Triumph of Constancie: Verie Fit for Young Courtiers to Peruse, and Coy Dames to Remember., London: […] Richard Ihones, […]:
   • Swiftly the news, / The dolorous sad news, because ’twas sad, / To Athens came. It reached the queen as she / Sweetful reclined within her room, and mused / Upon the thwarting of her love:[…] 1869, Henry Martin, “Phædra”, in Phædra, and Other Poems, London: (for the Author) John Camden Hotten, […], page 48:
   • And as they stept, / The maiden wept, / So sweetful was Love’s tune! 1889 October 5, S. J. Adair Fitz-Gerald, “Dan Cupid on a Day. A Madrigal.”, in Pick-Me-Up, volume III, number 53, London: […] the Office, […], published 1890, page 5:
   • I begin to read two or three chapters for a time; but the sweetful words draw me to read about eight or nine chapters. 1821 January 9, Ayyavoo’s letter, quotee, “Appendix XII. Extracts from the Journals and Reports of John Devasagayam, Relative to the School Establishments, at Tranquebar, for the Year 1821.”, in Proceedings of the Church Missionary Society for Africa and the East. Twenty-Second Year. 1821—1822. […], London: […] R. Watts, […]. Published for the Society, by L. B. Seeley, […]; and J. Hatchard and Son, […], published 1822, page 296:
   • Forthwith I mingled with my fellow-men, / And studiously from records of the past, / And from the flowing tide of human being, / Cull’d deepest knowledge of their history,— / Intent to fructify my life with theirs / In sweetful, wide communion. 1873, Walter Rew, “The Dying Poet”, in Maud Vivian: A Drama; and Poems, London: E. Moxon, Son, & Co., […], page 171:
   • In his own language, he wasted the “sweetful fragrance of his voice upon the desert air.” 1856 January 10, “Congress”, in Daily American Organ, volume II, number 49 (whole 366), Washington, D.C.:
   • He [Cicero] travelled to Athens for the recovery of his health, where his body was so strengthened by gymnastic exercises as to become firm and robust, and his voice, which had been harsh, was thoroughly formed and rendered sweetful and sonorous. 1862 October 11, “Miscellaneous Intelligence”, in The East Kent Gazette, Sittingbourne, Faversham, and Sheerness Gazette, and Rochester and Chatham Chronicle, number 337, Sittingbourne, section “The Importance of Physical Training”:
   • The beauty of the poem, and that which we desire to emphasize, is the sweetful simplicity that pervades it. 1885 May 30, R. D. H[?]att, “What I Love”, in The Kearney County Advocate, volume I, number 2, Lakin, Kan.:

Forms

Deriveds

sweetfully · sweetfulness