vulpinary

English

Etymology

vulpine +‎ -ary

Adjective

vulpinary (comparative more vulpinary, superlative most vulpinary)

1. (rare) Crafty, sly, shrewd.
   • 1721, An Universal Etymological English Dictionary, etc‎^[1]:

     Vulpinary, [Vulpinaris,L.] crafty, subtile, wily.

   • 1757 November 5–8, Evening Advertiser, “Of a late Resignation”, in The London Chronicle: or, Universal Evening Post, volume II, page 446, column 2:

     It is well known that, in a late Struggle, when a certain vulpinary Stateſman attempted to force himſelf into Power, it was thought a ſufficient Objection to his Claim, that he was honoured with the Friendſhip and Intimacy of an eminent Perſonage, over whom he might be ſuppoſed to have too great an Aſcendancy.

   • 1820, The Edinburgh magazine, and literary miscellany, a new series of The Scots magazine, page 129, column 1:

     The latter is the name by which this vulpinary veteran of the black art was universally known […]

   • 1838 November 20, The North Wales Chronicle, and General Advertiser‎^[2], volume XI, number 594:

     Hence have the vulpinary recipients of secret service money been commanded to dress up Toryism in the character of Raw-head-and-Bloody-bones, to scare the day dreams of the dwarfish men with which the nation unfortunately abounds.

   • 1845 July 1, “Anglesey Horticultural Society”, in The North Wales Chronicle‎^[3], volume 17, number 974, Bangor, Carnarvonshire: […] John Brown:

     The juveniles cast many a vulpinary glance at the forbidden fruit, but turned away with a sour-grape like expression of countenance.

   • 1847 January 12, The North Wales Chronicle‎^[4], volume 19, number 1035, Bangor, Carnarvonshire: […] John Brown:

     Lord Palmerston’s threatened revelations anent the delicate subject of citizen King duplicity are looked for with some anxiety; and if it be true that Lord Brougham is charged with our vulpinary friend’s vindication, with his acknowledged knight errantry, it would be impossible, one would say, to avoid a collision betwixt Lords and Commons.

2. (rare) Relating to a fox.
   • 1827, Isaac G. Hutton, The vigneron; an essay on the culture of the grape and the making of wine, pages 15–16:

     Trust the native vine;—
     The Fox, the Bland, Schuylkill, and Catawba.
     These have withstood the chill northwestern blast,
     The burning sun-beams, and the summer's drought,
     The shade of trees, and most untimely rains.
     While naught of tillage at the root appears,
     No pruning knife has lopped the useless growth
     Of vagrant tendrils, yielding only leaves.
     What from the matted canopy that spreads,
     Untutored and at will, its tender shoots
     Oe'r tall tap-rooted trees, can you expect
     But grapes, (if grapes at all,) diminutive,
     And branded with a vulpinary name.
     Yet take the fox or racoon and their kinds,
     Into thy fertile soil and tend them well,
     And but a year or two shall pass away,
     Till a fair promise shall inspire thy hope.

   • 1837, Sporting Magazine, page 394, columns 1 and 2:

     I belonged to this latter division—not that I had any idea of a run, but, having viewed the fox take that ascent, I wished to see how they would tackle him now that the crowd was tolerably well disposed of. […] The Hassocks, where this day’s who-whoop was sounded, seems be the vulpinary Golgotha of this district of the East Sussex.

3. (rare) Not spiritual or religious; common.
   • 1848, The Dirge; or, A Voice in the Night. Originally Addressed to a Clergyman at Edinburgh, 1845., Edinburgh: […] Anderson and Bryce, […], →OCLC, pages 66–67, 208, 438, and 575:

     Spiritive as Scriptural mana is a fruit, under which excellent and concentrative typive man hath freely given to him to name or choose for himself the due ratify, this beautiful or bountiful gateway to the high lens in the ùòmanative heavens, renders all vulpinary sorrel a garnishment suitable to itself. […] When Christ took the conjunct humanlys, it was to tread or stamp upon them in the educative spirit of his presumptuory life; for in a distinct and atomised humiliation it was highly characteristic to make sovereign use of the vulgar or vulpinary title, as best becoming dececration in the conductuory; and it behoved to be put on in contrast this his lowest height, as the phaseos or Saviour in the redeemable humanly. […] True sorrow wraps itself close from unaniciated and untempered eyes, and great is the mastery of godliness in making no profession; always the seat of truth’s confessional, is secret and sacred; as God in subjecting evil agency works by vulpinary cause. […] If we weep by Babel’s streams, the sparkle of our chrystal tears, touch the beam which kindles from above; and the “curled darlings of the nations” may sigh in vain so to prefigure their vulpinary Shad-wrack; alas our shultifying times, do give place in a vague for ever.