hardihood

Noun

hardihood (countable and uncountable, plural hardihoods)

1. Unyielding boldness and daring; firmness in doing something that exposes one to difficulty, danger, or calamity; intrepidness.
   • […] he came to impart other news; to prepare the Earl for death; for the morrow was appointed for his execution. He received the intelligence with the firm hardihood of indignant virtue, disdaining to solicit, and disdaining to repine […]1789, Ann Ward Radcliffe, chapter 4, in The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne, London: T. Hookham, page 81
   • Their talk, however, was the talk of sordid buccaneers: it was reckless without hardihood, greedy without audacity, and cruel without courage; there was not an atom of foresight or of serious intention in the whole batch of them, and they did not seem aware these things are wanted for the work of...1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], →OCLC, part I
2. Excessive boldness; foolish daring; offensive assurance.
   • […] that God should enact a dispensation for hard hearts to do that wherby they must live in priviledg’d adultery, however it go for the receav’d opinion, I shall ever disswade my self from so much hardihood as to beleeve:1644, J[ohn] M[ilton], The Doctrine or Discipline of Divorce: […], 2nd edition, London: [s.n.], →OCLC, book I, page 25
   • I have not the hardihood to dare to be vilely dishonest.1798, Hannah Brand, “Adelinda”, in Plays and Poems, Norwich, act I, scene 1, page 358
3. Of a plant, an ability to withstand extreme conditions, hardiness.
   • The cheapness and hardihood of the musk-plant and marigold, to say nothing of their peculiar odour, has made them the most popular of “roots” […]1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, volume 1, London: George Woodfall & Son, page 144
   • Now, as green sap ascends the steepled wood,
     Each hedge with such white bloom astounds our eyes
     As sprang from Joseph’s rod, and testifies
     How best beauty’s born of hardihood.1957, Sylvia Plath, “Mayflower”, in Collected Poems, New York: Harper & Row, published 1981, page 60