selfsame — English Dictionary

Adjective

1. Chiefly preceded by the: precisely the same; the very same; the same not only in being similar but in being identical.

   Usage

   • not-comparable

   Antonyms

   other

   Examples

   For both of you are Birds of ſelfe-ſame Feather.

   More examples (1)

   In my ſchoole dayes, vvhen I had loſt one ſhaft [i.e., arrow], / I ſhot his fellovv of the ſelfe-ſame flight / The ſelfe-ſame vvay, vvith more aduiſed vvatch / To finde the other foorth, and by aduentring both, / I oft found both. I vrge this child-hoode proofe, / Becauſe vvhat follovves, is pure innocence.

   He and his Horse, were of a piece. / One Spirit did inform them both, / The self-same Vigor, Fury, Wroth: […]

   More examples (5)

   He trod the very ſelf-ſame ground you tread, / And victory refuted all he ſaid.

   Mine be the strength of spirit fierce and free, / Like some broad river rushing down alone, / With the selfsame impulse wherewith he was thrown / From his loud fount upon the echoing lea:— […]

   And Quack and Dupe, as we must ever keep in mind, are upper-side and under of the self-same substance; convertible personages: turn up your dupe into the proper fostering element, and he himself can become a quack; […]

   But in [Isaac] Newton, science was as easy as breathing; he used the same wit to weigh the moon that he used to buckle his shoes; and all his life was simple, wise, and majestic. So it was in Archimedes,—always self-same, like the sky.

   [T]hrough my police issue 200 × 6000 macroscopic laser-prism binoculars I could see he was the same guy who had just bopped the doorman in the head. […] But you can imagine my surprise when I angled said state-of-the-art bins to the street, watched the long black car as it rolled up and saw the self-same guy step out of it.

Noun

1. Chiefly preceded by the: precisely the same person or thing.

   Usage

   • Archaic

   Examples

   I preſent vvhat here is to you, vvherein you ſhall receive but the ſelfeſame by Number and by Meaſure; vvhich, before, you had by VVeight.

   More examples (1)

   So ſtrictly is the Specific Nature preſerv'd in the Individuals of the ſame kind, vvho all equally partake of it, and are ſo very reſembling and uniform in it, that they ſeem but as ſo many Self-ſames, ſo many Reproductions of one thing, like the Image of the ſame Face repeated by a Multiplying Glaſs. Thus for Inſtance, in Men, there is the ſame common Human Nature in all of them vvithout Intenſion or Remiſſion, the ſame Intellectual Frame, the ſame thinking Principle, the ſame rational Faculties, the ſame Radical Deſires and Inclinations, the ſame Natural Affections, the ſame Springs of Paſſion, &c.

Adjective

1. being the exact same one; not any other:

   Synonyms

   identicalvery

   Examples

   this is the identical room we stayed in before

   saw the selfsame quotation in two newspapers

   More examples (3)

   on this very spot

   the very thing he said yesterday

   the very man I want to see