Words of the Week

I have come across a number of lovely words in my recent readings, and I thought I would share them with you. I am particularly taken with the last of these, and am just waiting for the right moment to spring it in to a conversation. ;)

Furbelowed

To decorate with a ruffle or flounce.

Mansard

1. Also called mansard roof. a hip roof, each face of which has a steeper lower part and a shallower upper part
2. the story under such a roof.

Palimpsest

a parchment or the like from which writing has been partially or completely erased to make room for another text.

Tamburlaine

Mongolian ruler of Samarkand who led his nomadic hordes to conquer an area from Turkey to Mongolia (1336-1405)

[My note: also known as Tamerlane, which I'm familiar with as it is the name of a large ocean going vessel owned by Wilhelmsen LInes.]

Astragals

A narrow convex molding often having the form of beading.

Dictionary.com has a nice illustration of this here.

Machair

The Scottish Gaelic word machair or machar refers to a fertile low-lying raised beach found on the some of the coastlines of Ireland and Scotland, in particular the Outer Hebrides.

For more detail you can visit Reference.com: http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Machair

Fantoosh

For this definition I needed to visit www.doubletongued.org.

fantouche
adj. fancy, extravagant, frivolous. Also fantoosh.

All other definitions are courtesy of Dictionary.com and affiliate websites.