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paperclip

A folder wire or plastic fastener for holding sheets of paper together.

paperhanging

The application of wallpaper to walls for decorative purposes.

paperknife

A dull knife used to cut open the envelopes in which letters are mailed or to slit uncut pages of books.

papers

Documents providing information, esp. of an official nature about a person, vehicle, business, etc. See paper{9}, n.

paperwork

Work that involves handling or writing documents such as forms, letters, reports, sales records, etc.

papery

Like paper; having the thinness or consistency of paper.

Papescent

Containing or producing pap; like pap.

Papess

A female pope; i. e., the fictitious pope Joan.

Papeterie

A case or box containing paper and materials for writing.

Paphian

A native or inhabitant of Paphos.

Papier-mache

A hard and strong substance made of a pulp from paper, mixed with size or glue, etc. It is formed into various articles, usually by means of molds.

Papiliones

The division of Lepidoptera which includes the butterflies.

Papilla

Any minute nipplelike projection; as, the papill/ of the tongue.

Papillary

Of, pertaining to, or resembling, a papilla or papill/; bearing, or covered with, papill/; papillose.

Papilloma

A tumor formed by hypertrophy of the papill/ of the skin or mucous membrane, as a corn or a wart.

Papillose

Covered with, or bearing, papill/; resembling papill/; papillate; papillar; papillary.

Papillote

A small piece of paper on which women roll up their hair to make it curl; a curl paper.

Papillulate

Having a minute papilla in the center of a larger elevation or depression.

Papion

A West African baboon (Cynocephalus sphinx), allied to the chacma. Its color is generally chestnut, varying in tint.

Papism

Popery; -- an offensive term.

Papist

A Roman Catholic; one who adheres to the Church of Rome and the authority of the pope; -- an offensive designation applied to Roman Catholics by their opponents.

Papistical Papistic

Of or pertaining to the Church of Rome and its doctrines and ceremonies; pertaining to popery; popish; -- used disparagingly.

Papistry

The doctrine and ceremonies of the Church of Rome; popery.

Papoose

A babe or young child of Indian parentage in North America.

papoose root papooseroot

A tall herb (Caulophyllum thalictroides) of eastern North America and Asia having blue berrylike fruit and a thick knotty rootstock formerly used medicinally; the Cohosh. See also Cohosh.

Pappiform

Resembling the pappus of composite plants.

Pappose

Furnished with a pappus; downy.

Pappus

The hairy or feathery appendage of the achenes of thistles, dandelions, and most other plants of the order Composit/; also, the scales, awns, or bristles which represent the calyx in other plants of the same order.

Pappy

Like pap; soft; succulent; tender.

Paprica Paprika

The dried ripened fruit of Capsicum annuum or various other species of pepper; also, the mildly pungent condiment prepared from it.

Papua

A Pacific island north of Australia; governed by Australia and Indonesia.

Papuan

Of or pertaining to Papua.

Papuars

The native black race of Papua or New Guinea, and the adjacent islands.

Papulose

Having papul/; papillose; as, a papulose leaf.

Papulous

Covered with, or characterized by, papul/; papulose.

Papyraceous

Made of papyrus; of the consistency of paper; papery.

Papyrean

Of or pertaining to papyrus, or to paper; papyraceous.

Papyrine

Imitation parchment, made by soaking unsized paper in dilute sulphuric acid.

Papyrograph

An apparatus for multiplying writings, drawings, etc., in which a paper stencil, formed by writing or drawing with corrosive ink, is used. The word is also used of other means of multiplying copies of writings, drawings, etc. See Copygraph, Hectograph, Manifold.

Papyrography

The process of multiplying copies of writings, etc., by means of the papyrograph.

Papyrus

A tall rushlike plant (Cyperus Papyrus) of the Sedge family, formerly growing in Egypt, and now found in Abyssinia, Syria, Sicily, etc. The stem is triangular and about an inch thick.

Paque

See Pasch and Easter.

Par

By; with; -- used frequently in Early English in phrases taken from the French, being sometimes written as a part of the word which it governs; as, par amour, or paramour; par cas, or parcase; par fay, or parfay.

Para

The southern arm of the Amazon in Brazil; also, a seaport on this arm.

Parabanic

Pertaining to, or designating, a nitrogenous acid which is obtained by the oxidation of uric acid, as a white crystalline substance (C3N2H2O3); -- also called oxalyl urea.

Parablast

A portion of the mesoblast (of peripheral origin) of the developing embryo, the cells of which are especially concerned in forming the first blood and blood vessels.

Parablastic

Of or pertaining to the parablast; as, the parablastic cells.

Parabola

A kind of curve; one of the conic sections formed by the intersection of the surface of a cone with a plane parallel to one of its sides. It is a curve, any point of which is equally distant from a fixed point, called the focus, and a fixed straight line, called the directrix. See Focus. One of a group of curves defined by the equation y = axn where n is a positive whole number or a positive fraction. For the cubical parabola n = 3; for the semicubical parabola n = /. See under Cubical, and Semicubical. The parabolas have infinite branches, but no rectilineal asymptotes.

Parabolism

The division of the terms of an equation by a known quantity that is involved in the first term.

Paraboloid

The solid generated by the rotation of a parabola about its axis; any surface of the second order whose sections by planes parallel to a given line are parabolas.

Parabronchium

One of the branches of an ectobronchium or entobronchium.

Paracelsian

A follower of Paracelsus or his practice or teachings.

Paracelsus

Philippus Aureolus Paracelsus (originally Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, also called Theophrastus Paracelsus and Theophrastus von Hohenheim). Born at Maria-Einsiedeln, in the Canton of Schwyz, Switzerland, Dec. 17 (or 10 Nov.), 1493: died at Salzburg, Sept. 23 (or 24), 1541. A celebrated German-Swiss physician, reformer of therapeutics, iatrochemist, and alchemist. He attended school in a small lead-mining district where his father, William Bombast von Hohenheim, was a physician and teacher of alchemy. The family originally came from W/rtemberg, where the noble family of Bombastus was in possession of the ancestral castle of Hohenheim near Stuttgart until 1409. He entered the University of Basel at the age of sixteen, where he adopted the name Paracelsus, after Celsius, a noted Roman physician. But he left without a degree, first going to Wurtzburg to study under Joannes Trithemius, Abbot of Sponheim (1462-1516), a famous astrologer and alchemist, who initiated him into the mysteries of alchemy. He then spent many years in travel and intercourse with distinguished scholars, studied and practiced medicine and surgery, and at one point attended the Diet of Worms. He was appointed to the office of city physician of Basel, which also made him a lecturer on medicine at Basel about 1526, where, through the publisher Johan Frobenius he made friends with the scholar Erasmus; and there he fulminated against the medical pseudo-science of his day, and against the blind adherence to ancient medical authorities such as Hippocrates, Galen, and Avicenna, which was still the prevalent philosophy of medicine in the sixteenth century. But soon, in 1528, he was driven from the city by the medical corporations, whose methods he had severely criticized. He found refuge with friends, and traveled and practiced medicine, but could not find a publisher willing to print his books. He preached frequently the need for experimentation in medicine. He is important in the history of medicine chiefly on account of the impetus which he gave to the development of pharmaceutical chemistry. He was also the author of a visionary and theosophic system of philosophy. The first collective edition of his works appeared at Basel in 1589-91. Among the many legends concerning him is that concerning his long sword, which he obtained while serving as barber-surgeon during the Neapolitan wars. It was rumored that in the hilt of the sword he kept a familiar or small demon; some thought he carried the elixer of life in the sword. He is buried in the cemetary of the Hospital of St. Sebastian in Salzburg. For more detailed information about Paracelsus, there is a special project, the Zurich Paracelsus Project available on the Web.

Paracentesis

The perforation of a cavity of the body with a trocar, aspirator, or other suitable instrument, for the evacuation of effused fluid, pus, or gas; tapping.

Parachordal

Situated on either side of the notochord; -- applied especially to the cartilaginous rudiments of the skull on each side of the anterior part of the notochord. A parachordal cartilage.

Parachronism

An error in chronology, by which the date of an event is set later than the time of its occurrence.

parachute

TO descend to th ground from an airplane or other high place using a parachute; as, when the plane stalled, he parachuted safely to the ground.

parachuting

The act or process of descending from a high altitude to the ground by means of a parachute.

parachutist parachuter

One who descends from a high altitude to the ground by means of a parachute, especially one who does so for sport or in a military operation.

Paraclete

An advocate; one called to aid or support; hence, the Consoler, Comforter, or Intercessor; -- a term applied to the Holy Spirit.

Paracmastic

Gradually decreasing; past the acme, or crisis, as a distemper.

Paraconic

Pertaining to, or designating, an organic acid obtained as a deliquescent white crystalline substance, and isomeric with itaconic, citraconic, and mesaconic acids.

Paraconine

A base resembling and isomeric with conine, and obtained as a colorless liquid from butyric aldehyde and ammonia.

Paracorolla

A secondary or inner corolla; a corona, as of the Narcissus.

Paracrostic

A poetical composition, in which the first verse contains, in order, the first letters of all the verses of the poem.

Paracyanogen

A polymeric modification of cyanogen, obtained as a brown or black amorphous residue by heating mercuric cyanide.

Parade

To make an exhibition or spectacle of one's self, as by walking in a public place.

parader

One who walks with regular or stately step.

paradiddle

The sound of a drum (especially a snare drum) beaten rapidly and continuously.

Paradigmatic

A writer of memoirs of religious persons, as examples of Christian excellence.

Paradisaical Paradisaic

Of or pertaining to, or resembling, paradise; paradisiacal; as, paradisaical innocence; an age of paradisaical happiness.

Paradise

To affect or exalt with visions of felicity; to entrance; to bewitch.

Paradised

Placed in paradise; enjoying delights as of paradise.

parados

An intercepting mound, erected in any part of a fortification to protect the defenders from a rear or ricochet fire; a traverse.

paradox

A tenet or proposition contrary to received opinion; an assertion or sentiment seemingly contradictory, or opposed to common sense; that which in appearance or terms is absurd, but yet may be true in fact.

Paradoxides

A genus of large trilobites characteristic of the primordial formations.

paradoxism

An avant-garde movement in literature, art, and philosophy, based on excessive used of antitheses, antinomies, contradictions, oxymorons, and paradoxes.

Paradoxure

Any species of Paradoxurus, a genus of Asiatic viverrine mammals allied to the civet, as the musang, and the luwack or palm cat (Paradoxurus hermaphroditus). See Musang.

Paradoxy

A paradoxical statement; a paradox.

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