1. PitchBlende, amorphous, black, pitchy form of the crystalline uranium oxide mineral uraninite (q.v.); it is one of the primary mineral ores of uranium, containing 50–80 percent of that element

2. Then, all at once, I cursed savagely, perhaps at myself, or my cowardice, or at Gregori or at the Botulinus virus, I don't know, turned abruptly and headed for the byre, taking the lamp with me, leaving the others standing there round the dead man in the rain-filled pitchy darkness like darkly-petrified mourners at some age-old heathen midnight