sourness
nounEtymology From Middle English sowrenesse, sournesse, from Old English sūrnes (“sourness”), equivalent to sour + -ness.
1
The condition or quality of being sour.
- [O]ur Tympanouſe ſtatiſts / (In their affected grauitie of voice, / Sovverneſſe of countenance, maners crueltie, / Authoritie, vvealth, and all the ſpavvne of Fortune) / Thinke they beare all the kingdomes vvorth before them; […]1603–1604 (date written), [George Chapman], Bussy D’Ambois: A Tragedie: […], London: […] [Eliot’s Court Press] for William Aspley, published 1607, →OCLC, Act I, page 1:
- Mrs. Ferrars was a little, thin woman, upright, even to formality, in her figure, and serious, even to sourness, in her aspect.1811, [Jane Austen], chapter XII, in Sense and Sensibility […], volume II, London: […] C[harles] Roworth, […], and published by T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC, page 226: