obnubilation

Noun

obnubilation (countable and uncountable, plural obnubilations)

1. The action of darkening or fact of being darkened, as with a cloud; obscuration.
   • 1610, John Healey (tr.), Sᵗ. Auguſtine, of the Citie of God: with the learned Comments of Io. Lod. Vives, bk 3, ch. 15, pp. 127–8, note e
   • Let then others glory in their triumphs, and trophies, in their obnubilation of bodies coruscant, that they have brought fear upon Champions, forced contributions from the Herculesses of manhood.1653, Edward Waterhouse, An humble apologie for learning and learned men, page 175
2. Obscuration or clouding of the mind or faculties.
   • 1753 Dec. 17th, John Rutty, A Spiritual Diary and Soliloquies in The Life of Samuel Johnſon, LL.D. (1791), aut. James Boswell, vol. II, “1777. Ætat. 68.”, p. 155
   • Dimness or obnubilation of sight.1803, Thomas Beddoes, Hygëia III, essay ix, p. 198
3. (literally, rare) A veiling with or concealment in clouds.
   • Homer, the father of the Poets, by these obnubilations, frequently rescues his heroes from the most imminent danger. Thus, in the third book of The Iliad, when Paris, defeated by Menelaus, is on the point of losing his life, Venus snatches him away in a fog: — // “Then, as once more he lifts the...1814 Jan. 15th, “Foggiana” in The Spirit of the Public Journals for 1814 (1815), p. 23
4. Something that obscures or causes confoundment; an obfuscation.
   • 1999, Balachandra Rajan, Under Western Eyes: India from Milton to Macaulay, Afterword, p. 206
   • The problem of error is crucial, for as Watt interrogates the foundations of rational inquiry, the distinctions between intended errors, authorial errors, mistakes introduced by publishers, changes of intention and other obnubilations loom all the larger.2009, Chris J. Ackerley, Watt, page Preface