Loading earlier words…
Attic

A low story above the main order or orders of a facade, in the classical styles; -- a term introduced in the 17th century. Hence: A room or rooms behind that part of the exterior; all the rooms immediately below the roof.

Atticism

A favoring of, or attachment to, the Athenians.

Attire

Dress; clothes; headdress; anything which dresses or adorns; esp., ornamental clothing.

Attired

Provided with antlers, as a stag.

Attitude

The posture, action, or disposition of a figure or a statue.

Attitudinize

To assume affected attitudes; to strike an attitude; to pose.

Attle

Rubbish or refuse consisting of broken rock containing little or no ore.

Attollent

Lifting up; raising; as, an attollent muscle.

Attorn

To turn, or transfer homage and service, from one lord to another. This is the act of feudatories, vassals, or tenants, upon the alienation of the estate.

Attorney

To perform by proxy; to employ as a proxy.

Attorney-general

The chief law officer of the state, empowered to act in all litigation in which the law-executing power is a party, and to advise this supreme executive whenever required.

Attorneyism

The practice or peculiar cleverness of attorneys.

Attorneyship

The office or profession of an attorney; agency for another.

Attornment

The act of a feudatory, vassal, or tenant, by which he consents, upon the alienation of an estate, to receive a new lord or superior, and transfers to him his homage and service; the agreement of a tenant to acknowledge the purchaser of the estate as his landlord.

Attractable

Capable of being attracted; subject to attraction.

Attraction

An invisible power in a body by which it draws anything to itself; the power in nature acting mutually between bodies or ultimate particles, tending to draw them together, or to produce their cohesion or combination, and conversely resisting separation.

Attractive

That which attracts or draws; an attraction; an allurement.

Attrap

To adorn with trapping; to array.

Attributable

Capable of being attributed; ascribable; imputable.

Attribute

That which is attributed; a quality which is considered as belonging to, or inherent in, a person or thing; an essential or necessary property or characteristic.

Attribution

The act of attributing or ascribing, as a quality, character, or function, to a thing or person, an effect to a cause.

Attributive

A word that denotes an attribute; esp. a modifying word joined to a noun; an adjective or adjective phrase.

Attrition

The act of rubbing together; friction; the act of wearing by friction, or by rubbing substances together; abrasion.

attritional

of or pertaining to attrition (definition 4).

Attry

Poisonous; malignant; malicious.

Atwirl

Twisted; distorted; awry.

Atwite

To speak reproachfully of; to twit; to upbraid.

Atwo

In two; in twain; asunder.

Atypical Atypic

That has no type; devoid of typical character; irregular; unlike the type.

Aubade

An open air concert in the morning, as distinguished from an evening serenade; also, a pianoforte composition suggestive of morning.

Aubaine

Succession to the goods of a stranger not naturalized.

Aubin

A broken gait of a horse, between an amble and a gallop; -- commonly called a Canterbury gallop.

Auchenium

The part of the neck nearest the back.

Auctary

That which is superadded; augmentation.

Auctionary

Of or pertaining to an auction or an auctioneer.

Audaciously

In an audacious manner; with excess of boldness; impudently.

Audaciousness

The quality of being audacious; impudence; audacity.

Audacity

Daring spirit, resolution, or confidence; venturesomeness.

Auden

An English poet in the U. S. Born 1907, died 1973.

Audibility

The quality of being audible; power of being heard; audible capacity.

Audience

The act of hearing; attention to sounds.

Audient

A hearer; especially a catechumen in the early church.

Audile

One whose thoughts take the form of mental sounds or of internal discourse rather than of visual or motor images.

audio

the part of a transmitted signal which conveys the sound of the event represented by the signal, such as that of a television program.

audio-lingual

pertaining to a method of teaching language that focuses on listening and speaking.

Audiometer

An instrument by which the power of hearing can be gauged and recorded on a scale.

audiotape

magnetic tape for use in recording sound.

audiovisual

materials using sight or sound to present information; -- usually used in the plural.

Audiphone

An instrument which, placed against the teeth, conveys sound to the auditory nerve and enables the deaf to hear more or less distinctly; a dentiphone.

Audit

To settle or adjust an account.

Audition

The act of hearing or listening; hearing.

Auditive

Of or pertaining to hearing; auditory.

Auditorium

The part of a church, theater, or other public building, assigned to the audience.

Auditory

An assembly of hearers; an audience.

Auf

A changeling or elf child, -- that is, one left by fairies; a deformed or foolish child; a simpleton; an oaf.

Aufklaerung

A philosophic movement of the 18th century characterized by a lively questioning of authority, keen interest in matters of politics and general culture, and an emphasis on empirical method in science. It received its impetus from the unsystematic but vigorous skepticism of Pierre Bayle, the physical doctrines of Newton, and the epistemological theories of Locke, in the preceding century. Its chief center was in France, where it gave rise to the skepticism of Voltaire , the naturalism of Rousseau, the sensationalism of Condillac, and the publication of the /Encyclopedia/ by D'Alembert and Diderot. In Germany, Lessing, Mendelssohn, and Herder were representative thinkers, while the political doctrines of the leaders of the American Revolution and the speculations of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine represented the movement in America.

Augean

Of or pertaining to Augeus, king of Elis, whose stable contained 3000 oxen, and had not been cleaned for 30 years. Hercules cleansed it in a single day.

augend

a number to which another number (the addend) is added.

Auger

A carpenter's tool for boring holes larger than those bored by a gimlet. It has a handle placed crosswise by which it is turned with both hands. A pod auger is one with a straight channel or groove, like the half of a bean pod. A screw auger has a twisted blade, by the spiral groove of which the chips are discharge.

Auget

A priming tube connecting the charge chamber with the gallery, or place where the slow match is applied.

Aught

At all; in any degree.

Augite

A variety of pyroxene, usually of a black or dark green color, occurring in igneous rocks, such as basalt; -- also used instead of the general term pyroxene.

Augitic

Pertaining to, or like, augite; containing augite as a principal constituent; as, augitic rocks.

Augment

Enlargement by addition; increase.

Augmentation

The act or process of augmenting, or making larger, by addition, expansion, or dilation; increase.

Augmentative

A word which expresses with augmented force the idea or the properties of the term from which it is derived; as, dullard, one very dull. Opposed to diminutive.

Augmenter

One who, or that which, augments or increases anything.

Augur

To predict or foretell, as from signs or omens; to betoken; to presage; to infer.

Loading more words…