hyperborean
adjEtymology From Late Latin hyperboreanus, cognate with Classical Latin hyperboreus, from Ancient Greek ὑπερβόρεος (huperbóreos), composed of ὑπέρ (hupér, “over”) + βόρειος (bóreios, “northern”). By surface analysis, nearly hyper- + boreal. See also Ὑπερβόρεοι (Huperbóreoi).
1
Pertaining to the extreme north of the earth; or (usually humorous) to a specific northern country or area.
- The hyperborean or frozen sea.1633, C. Butler, (Please provide the book title or journal name):
- Hovv, by the fineſt art, the native robe / To vveave; hovv, vvhite as hyperborean ſnovv, / To form the lucid lavvn; […]1730, James Thomson, “Autumn. Inscribed to the Right Honourable Arthur Onslow, Esq; Speaker of the House of Commons.”, in The Seasons, London: [s.n.], →OCLC, page 167, lines 857–859:
2 more examples
- You could have knelt down, damn it, Kinch, when your dying mother asked you, Buck Mulligan said. I’m hyperborean as much as you. But to think of your mother begging you with her last breath to kneel down and pray for her. And you refused.1922 February, James Joyce, Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:
- Amongst the fish that the Nautilus frightened as it passed, I will cite the metre-long cyclopteroid with a black back and orange stomach, providing an example of conjugal fidelity rarely followed by its congeners, a huge Forsskal's stingray, a sort of emerald moray eel which has a excellent taste, big-eyed carracks whose heads resemble dogs', blennies viviparous like snakes, 20-centimetre frillgobies or black gudgeons, and Macrura with long tails and shining with a silvery glitter: quick fish that had ventured far from hyperborean seas.1998 [1871], Jules Verne, translated by William Butcher, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas, revised, illustrated edition: