hasty

comparative hastier · superlative hastiest

1. Acting or done in haste; hurried or too quick; speedy due to having little time.

   Without much thinking about it they made a hasty decision to buy it.

   4 more examples

   If there bee any lasie fellow, any that cannot away with worke, any that would wallow in pleasures, hee is hastie to be priested. And when hee is made one, and has gotten a benefice, he consorts with his neighbour priests, who are altogether given to pleasures; and then both hee, and they, live, not like Christians, but like epicures; drinking, eating, feasting, and revelling, till the cow come home, as the saying is.

   1610, Alexander Cooke, Pope Joane, in William Oldys, editor, The Harleian Miscellany: or, A Collection of Scarce, Curious, and Entertaining Pamphlets and Tracts, as well in Manuscript as in Print, Found in the Late Earl of Oxford's Library: Interspersed with Historical, Political, and Critical Notes: With a Table of the Contents, and an Alphabetical Index, volume IV, London: Printed for T[homas] Osborne, in Gray's-Inn, 1744, OCLC 5325177; republished as John Maltham, editor, The Harleian Miscellany; or, A Collection of Scarce, Curious, and Entertaining Pamphlets and Tracts, as well in Manuscript as in Print, Found in the Late Earl of Oxford's Library, Interspersed with Historical, Political, and Critical Notes, volume IV, London: Printed for R. Dutton, 1808–1811, OCLC 30776079, page 95

   I have written these hasty lines in no small hurry, and send them to you, not from an opinion, that they contain any thing worth imparting, but merely in compliance with your and Mr Simon's request[…]

   1756, Royal society of London, The Philosophical Transactions and Collections: Abridged and Disposed Under General Heads, page 627

   Watch yourself, be the first to ask pardon if you both err, and guard against the little piques, misunderstandings, and hasty words that often pave the way for bitter sorrow and regret.

   1868, Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

   But about three o'clock George's ear caught the hasty and decided click of a horse's hoof coming behind them at some distance and jogged Phineas by the elbow.

   1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin

   Synonyms: brash

   1. Made in haste.

      Sommer Hony, or hasty hony, made in thirty dales after the tenth of June.

      1577, B. Googe, Herebach's Husb., IV, page 184 (quoted in the NED)

      1 more example

      [We] built a hasty fort of sawlogs and boulders back of our campsite, well stocked with powder and ball, water and meat, in case there was trouble.

      2013 October 8, Robert F. Jones, Deadville: A Novel, Skyhorse, →ISBN

      Synonyms: brash

   2. Ripening or coming to maturity early.

      I speke not of hasty pees, for they be sowen before Christmasse

      1767, Robert Vansittart, Certain Ancient Tracts Concerning the Management of Landed Property Reprinted, page 14

      1 more example

      ... how to make the trees themselves more tall, more spread, and more hasty and sudden than they use to be.

      1826 [1626], Francis Bacon, The Works of Francis Bacon, Lord Chancellor of England: Containing Sylva sylvarum: or, a natural history, In ten centuries, page 209

      Synonyms: brash

   3. Eager or impatient to act or get something done.

      ... the Queene is not so hasty of your death.

      1877 [????], No-body, No-body and some-body [a comedy. supplied in MS.]

      1 more example

      ... how is it that ye be so hasty to […] departe hens?

      1882, Sir Sidney L. Lee, The Boke of Duke Huon of Burdeaux,., page 227

      Synonyms: brash

   4. Characterized by undue quickness of action, and thus lacking careful thought or consideration; rash, precipitate.

      a hasty decision, a hasty assertion

      1 more example

      ... to give too hasty belief to pretended miracles,[…]

      1839 [?], Thomas Hobbes, The English Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, page 435

      Synonyms: brash

2. archaicSpeedy, quick, rapid (without necessarily lacking time).

   This people hathe a swyfte hasty speche.

   1895 [1511], Pietro Martire d' Anghiera, Sebastian Münster, The First Three English Books on America, Westminster : A. Constable

   1 more example

   Thys wolfbayne of all poysones is the most hastye poison.

   1861, Alexander Irvine, The Phytologist: A Botanical Journal, page 144

3. Irritable, irascible; quickly or easily excited to anger.

   his hasty temperament

   3 more examples

   The natural disposition of Theodosius was hasty and choleric;[…]

   1840, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, page 321

   ... I spake eny hasty worde […]

   1883 [1534], The Boke of Duke Huon of Burdeux, Done Into English by Sir John Bourchier, Lord Berners, and Printed by Wynkyn de Worde about 1534, page 145

   To say that such a one has rather a hasty temper, or that he is difficult to get on with, or that he is too fond of having his own way, is hardly, in the opinion of many people, to say anything really to his discredit;[…]

   1891, Arthur's Home Magazine, page 411

4. Heavy, violent.

   '[…] rain divert me, although it is coming down hasty.'

   2020 August 20, Evie Grace, The Golden Maid, Random House, →ISBN

   2 more examples

   Hasty rain liberates flukes' eggs from sheep's droppings, and splashes them round about upon the circumjacent herbage; but healthy sheep, protected by their nose, are in little danger here of swallowing these eggs […]

   1862, James Beart SIMONDS, The Rot in Sheep: Its Nature, Cause, Treatment, and Prevention. Illustrated, Etc, page 15

   ... hasty rain. When we came home we found Cousin Gwinn Harris and wife at our home. In the evening there was still another rain. These rains are all alike (hard and hasty).[…]

   1990, David Golightly Harris, Piedmont Farmer: The Journals of David Golightly Harris, 1855-1870, Univ. of Tennessee Press, →ISBN, page 149

plural Hastys · alternative Hastey · alternative Hastie

1. countableuncountableA surname.
2. countableuncountableAn unincorporated community in Newton County, Arkansas, United States.
3. countableuncountableA census-designated place in Bent County, Colorado, United States.