ruel-bone
English
editEtymology
editLearned borrowing from Middle English rewell bon, ruel bon (“walrus ivory”), from Old French roal, rohal (“walrus ivory”), ultimately from Old Norse hrosshvalr (“walrus”).
Noun
editruel-bone (plural ruel-bones)
- (archaic, literary) A piece of ivory, generally from a marine mammal.
- 1850, James Orchard Halliwell-Phillipps, A Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words, Obsolete Phrases, Proverbs, and Ancient Customs, from the Fourteenth Century, page 697:
- RUEL-BONE Is mentioned by Chaucer, and in the following passage, as the material of a saddle. It is not, of course, to be thence supposed that ruel-bone was commonly or even actually used for that purpose, […]
- 1962, J.R.R. Tolkien, The Sea-Bell:
- White it glimmered, and the sea shimmered
with star-mirrors in a silver net;
cliffs of stone pale as ruel-bone
in the moon-foam were gleaming wet.
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