- intense
- c.1400, from M.Fr. intense, from L. intensus "stretched, strained, tight," originally pp. of intendere "to stretch out, strain" (see intend); thus, literally, "high-strung." Intensity formed in Eng. 1665 (earlier was intenseness, 1614); sense of "extreme depth of feeling" first recorded 1830. Intensify (1817) was first used by Coleridge, in place of intend, which was no longer felt as connected with intense.