TEMPEST • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Tempest

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/tˈɛmpəst/ Listen

noun

Tempest n.

An extensive current of wind, rushing with great velocity and violence, and commonly attended with rain, hail, or snow; a furious storm. "(We) caught in a fiery tempest, shall be hurled, Each on his rock transfixed."

Fig.: Any violent tumult or commotion; as, a political tempest; a tempest of war, or of the passions.

A fashionable assembly; a drum. See the Note under Drum, n., 4. (Archaic) Note: Tempest is sometimes used in the formation of self-explaining compounds; as, tempest-beaten, tempest-loving, tempest-tossed, tempest-winged, and the like.

Synonyms: Storm; agitation; perturbation. See Storm.

verb

Tempest v. t. To disturb as by a tempest. (Obs.) "Part huge of bulk Wallowing unwieldy, enormous in their gait, Tempest the ocean."

Tempest v. i. To storm. (Obs.)

See images of 'Tempest'

Etymology of 'Tempest'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Tempest" Quotes from Famous Books

... soon after we entered the tropics, an awful storm burst upon our ship. The first squall of wind carried away two of our masts, and left only the foremast standing. Even this, however, was more than enough, for we did not dare to hoist a rag of sail on it. For five days the tempest raged in all its fury. Everything was swept off the decks, except one small boat. The steersman was lashed to the wheel lest he should be washed away, and we all gave ourselves up for lost. The captain said that he had ...

— The Coral Island • R.M. Ballantyne

... up. Connected with this tempest there was one feature to which I have already alluded—the wonderful colours of the clouds. Some were of vivid green, others of the brightest orange, others as black as pitch. The gypsy's finger was pointed to a particular ...

— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter

... I have invoked in song Descends on me; my spirit's bark is driven Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng Whose sails were never to the tempest given. The massy earth and sphered skies are riven! I am borne darkly, fearfully afar; Whilst burning through the inmost veil of Heaven, The soul of Adonais, like a star, Beacons from the abode where the ...

— Percy Bysshe Shelley • John Addington Symonds

... Kurz, but without success. At last, out of all patience, he extended his hands to the two ends of the harpsichord, and, bringing them rapidly together, exclaimed, as he rose from the instrument, "The devil take the tempest." "That's it! That's it!" cried the harlequin, springing upon his neck and almost suffocating him. Haydn used to say that when he crossed the Straits of Dover in bad weather, many years afterwards, he often smiled to ...

— Haydn • J. Cuthbert Hadden

... of Females were made out of the Sea. These are Women of variable uneven Tempers, sometimes all Storm and Tempest, sometimes all Calm and Sunshine. The Stranger who sees one of these in her Smiles and Smoothness would cry her up for a Miracle of good Humour; but on a sudden her Looks and her Words are changed, she is nothing but Fury and Outrage, ...

— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele

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