efflower
English edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from French effleurer.
Pronunciation edit
- (Received Pronunciation) enPR: ĕflouərʹ, IPA(key): /ɛˈflaʊɚ/
Verb edit
efflower (third-person singular simple present efflowers, present participle efflowering, simple past and past participle efflowered)
- (rare) To graze; (leatherworking) to remove the outer surface of (a skin) with a knife.
- 1864, Andrew Ure, “A Dictionary of Arts, Manufactures and Mines”, in Leather, volume II:
- Chamois or Shamoy leather.—The skins are first washed, limed, fleeced, and branned as above described. They are next efflowered, that is, deprived of their epidermis by a concave knife, blunt in its middle part, upon the convex horse-beam.
- 1913, John Galen Howard, “From olive groves of academe”, in University of California Chronicle, page 101:
- In the pregnant bounds / Of delicatest breath, that but efflowers the ear / And lapses into nothingness[.]
- 1972, Sophia Frances Ann Caulfeild, Blanche C. Saward, Encyclopedia of Victorian Needlework: Dictionary of Needlework, page 64:
- Chamois leather—The skin of the Alpine goat of that name, which has been “efflowered” or deprived of the epidermis.
Related terms edit
Translations edit
leatherworking: remove an outer surface with a knife — see graze