arctic

1. not comparableAlternative letter-case form of Arctic.

1. Alternative letter-case form of Arctic.

plural arctics

1. Alternative letter-case form of Arctic.
2. For quotations using this term, see Citations:arctic.

alternative arctic

1. in compoundsnot comparableastronomyPertaining to the celestial north pole, or to the pole star.First known use 14th c.
2. not comparablegeographyPertaining to the northern polar region of the planet, characterised by extreme cold and an icy landscape.First known use 16th c.

   A medical examination determined who was to be sent on to Norilsk in the Arctic.

   1968, Robert Conquest, “A Nation in Torment”, in The Great Terror: Stalin's Purge of the Thirties, Macmillan Company, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 327

   2 more examples

   What neede the artick people loue star-light, To whom the sunne shines both by day and night.

   1594, Christopher Marlow[e], The Troublesome Raigne and Lamentable Death of Edward the Second, King of England: […], London: […] [Eliot’s Court Press] for Henry Bell, […], published 1622, →OCLC, (please specify the page)

   […] on th’ other side Incenc’t with indignation Satan stood Unterrifi’d, and like a Comet burn’d, That fires the length of Ophiucus huge In th’ Artick Sky, and from his horrid hair Shakes Pestilence and Warr.

   1667, John Milton, “Book II”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 706-711

3. not comparableExtremely cold, snowy, or having other properties of extreme winter associated with the climate of the Arctic.First known use 16th c.

   ‘Could you close that window, please!’ Strickland called, dialling again. ‘It's bloody arctic down this end.’

   1979, John Le Carré, Smiley's People, Folio Society, published 2010, page 45

   1 more example

   See freedom smiling thro’ the realms of frost, And glow on Labradore’s inclement coast, Tho’ darkness sheds deep night thro’ half the year, And snow invests the clime,—that clime is dear, For there fair liberty resides, and there At large the native breasts the searching air, Where blows the arctic tempests icy gale, And famine seizes on the spermy whale,

   1788, Samuel Jackson Pratt, Humanity, or the Rights of Nature, London: T. Cadell, Book 2, p. 96

4. not comparableDesigned for use in very cold conditions.First known use 19th c.

   Arctic gear

alternative arctic

1. obsoleteThe north celestial pole.First known use 15th–17th c.
2. A continental region consisting of the portion of the Earth north of the Arctic Circle, containing the North Pole.First known use 17th c.

   I’ve visited the world from arctic to ecliptic, as a surgeon does a hospital, and find all men sick of some distemper […]

   1772, Richard Cumberland, The Fashionable Lover, London: W. Griffin, act IV, page 46

   1 more example

   But no one had ever traversed the Northwest Passage under wind power alone. Inspired by my previous journeys to the Arctic and by journals of the early explorers, I had long hoped to sail the passage.

   1989 May, Jeff MacInnis, “Braving the Northwest Passage”, in National Geographic, volume 175, number 5, page 586

plural Arctics · alternative arctic

1. UShistoricalA warm waterproof overshoe.First known use 19th c.
2. Any of various butterflies of the genus Oeneis.First known use 20th c.