wainscot
English edit
Etymology edit
From Middle English waynscot, from Middle Low German wagenschot, assumed to be from wagen (“wagon”) + schot, believed to mean “partition”.
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
wainscot (plural wainscots)
- (architecture) An area of wooden (especially oaken) panelling on the lower part of a room’s walls.
- 1598, William Shakespeare, As You Like It, act 3, scene 3:
- […] this fellow will but join you together as they join wainscot; then one of you will prove a shrunk panel, and like green timber, warp, warp.
- 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 3, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 11:
- Entering that gable-ended Spouter-Inn, you found yourself in a wide, low, straggling entry with old-fashioned wainscots, reminding one of the bulwarks of some condemned old craft.
- Any of various noctuid moths.
Synonyms edit
- panelling (uncountable)
Translations edit
an area of wooden panelling on the lower part of a room's walls
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Verb edit
wainscot (third-person singular simple present wainscots, present participle wainscotting, simple past and past participle wainscotted)
- To decorate a wall with a wainscot.
Translations edit
to decorate a wall with a wainscot
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References edit
- ^ Jespersen, Otto (1909) A Modern English Grammar on Historical Principles (Sammlung germanischer Elementar- und Handbücher; 9)[1], volume I: Sounds and Spellings, London: George Allen & Unwin, published 1961, § 4.412, page 128.