{ } a. Made or decorated after the fanciful style of the ornamentation in the Alhambra, which affords an unusually fine exhibition of Saracenic or Arabesque architecture. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ F. arabesque, fr. It. arabesco, fr. Arabo Arab. ] A style of ornamentation either painted, inlaid, or carved in low relief. It consists of a pattern in which plants, fruits, foliage, etc., as well as figures of men and animals, real or imaginary, are fantastically interlaced or put together. [ 1913 Webster ]

☞ It was employed in Roman imperial ornamentation, and appeared, without the animal figures, in Moorish and Arabic decorative art. (See Moresque.) The arabesques of the Renaissance were founded on Greco-Roman work. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. 1. Arabian. [ Obs. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Relating to, or exhibiting, the style of ornament called arabesque; as, arabesque frescoes. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Ornamented in the style of arabesques. [ 1913 Webster ]

adj. 1. resembling a tree in form and branching structure.
Syn. -- arboreal, arboreous, arborescent, arboriform, dendriform, dendroid, dendroidal, treelike, tree-shaped. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

adj. 1. of or pertaining to W. H. Auden. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. Barbaric in form or style; as, barbaresque architecture. De Quincey. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. (Painting) Characterized by blots or heavy touches; coarsely depicted; wanting in delineation. Ruskin. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ F. burlesque, fr. It. burlesco, fr. burla jest, mockery, perh. for burrula, dim. of L. burrae trifles. See Bur. ] Tending to excite laughter or contempt by extravagant images, or by a contrast between the subject and the manner of treating it, as when a trifling subject is treated with mock gravity; jocular; ironical. [ 1913 Webster ]

It is a dispute among the critics, whether burlesque poetry runs best in heroic verse, like that of the Dispensary, or in doggerel, like that of Hudibras. Addison. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. Ludicrous representation; exaggerated parody; grotesque satire. [ 1913 Webster ]

Burlesque is therefore of two kinds; the first represents mean persons in the accouterments of heroes, the other describes great persons acting and speaking like the basest among the people. Addison. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. An ironical or satirical composition intended to excite laughter, or to ridicule anything. [ 1913 Webster ]

The dull burlesque appeared with impudence,
And pleased by novelty in spite of sense. Dryden. [ 1913 Webster ]

3. A ludicrous imitation; a caricature; a travesty; a gross perversion. [ 1913 Webster ]

Who is it that admires, and from the heart is attached to, national representative assemblies, but must turn with horror and disgust from such a profane burlesque and abominable perversion of that sacred institute? Burke. [ 1913 Webster ]

Syn. -- Mockery; farce; travesty; mimicry. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. [ imp. & p. p. Burlesqued p. pr. & vb. n. Burlesquing ] To ridicule, or to make ludicrous by grotesque representation in action or in language. [ 1913 Webster ]

They burlesqued the prophet Jeremiah's words, and turned the expression he used into ridicule. Stillingfleet. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. i. To employ burlesque. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. One who burlesques. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ Cf. It. Dantesco. ] Dantelike; Dantean. Earle. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. i. [ L. desquamatus, p. p. of desquamare to scale off; de- + squama scale. ] (Med.) To peel off in the form of scales; to scale off, as the skin in certain diseases. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ Cf. F. desquamation. ] (Med.) The separation or shedding of the cuticle or epidermis in the form of flakes or scales; exfoliation, as of bones.

{ } a. Of, pertaining to, or attended with, desquamation. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. (Surg.) An instrument formerly used in removing the laminæ of exfoliated bones. [ 1913 Webster ]

[ F., fr. It. -isco. Cf. -ish. ] A suffix of certain words from the French, Italian, and Spanish. It denotes manner or style; like; as, arabesque, after the manner of the Arabs. [ 1913 Webster ]

n.; pl. Esquimaux [ F. ] Same as Eskimo. [ 1913 Webster ]

It is . . . an error to suppose that where an Esquimau can live, a civilized man can live also. McClintock. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ OF. escuyer, escuier, properly, a shield-bearer, F. écuyer shield-bearer, armor-bearer, squire of a knight, esquire, equerry, rider, horseman, LL. scutarius shield-bearer, fr. L. scutum shield, akin to Gr. &unr_; skin, hide, from a root meaning to cover; prob. akin to E. hide to cover. See Hide to cover, and cf. Equerry, Escutcheon. ] Originally, a shield-bearer or armor-bearer, an attendant on a knight; in modern times, a title of dignity next in degree below knight and above gentleman; also, a title of office and courtesy; -- often shortened to squire. [ 1913 Webster ]

☞ In England, the title of esquire belongs by right of birth to the eldest sons of knights and their eldest sons in perpetual succession; to the eldest sons of younger sons of peers and their eldest sons in perpetual succession. It is also given to sheriffs, to justices of the peace while in commission, to those who bear special office in the royal household, to counselors at law, bachelors of divinity, law, or physic, and to others. In the United States the title is commonly given in courtesy to lawyers and justices of the peace, and is often used in the superscription of letters instead of Mr. [ 1913 Webster ]

v. t. [ imp. & p. p. Esquired p. pr. & vb. n. Esquiring. ] To wait on as an esquire or attendant in public; to attend. [ Colloq. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

‖n. [ F. See Sketch. ] (Fine Arts) The first sketch of a picture or model of a statue. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ F. ] Befitting a giant; bombastic; magniloquent. [ 1913 Webster ]

The sort of mock-heroic gigantesque
With which we bantered little Lilia first. Tennyson. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ F., fr. It. grottesco, fr. grotta grotto. See Grotto. ] 1. Like the figures found in ancient grottoes; grottolike. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Hence: Wildly or strangely formed; whimsical; extravagant; of irregular forms and proportions; fantastic; ludicrous; antic. “Grotesque design.” Dryden. “Grotesque incidents.” Macaulay. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. 1. A whimsical figure, or scene, such as is found in old crypts and grottoes. Dryden. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Artificial grotto-work. [ 1913 Webster ]

adv. In a grotesque manner. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. Quality of being grotesque. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. [ Written also grotesquerie. ] [ From Grotesque. ] Grotesque action, speech, or manners; grotesque doings; ludicrous or incongruous unnaturalness or distortion. “The sustained grotesquery of Feather-top.” K. L. Bates.
Syn. -- grotesqueness. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. + WordNet 1.5 ]

Vileness, on the other hand, becomes grotesquerie, wonderfully converted into a subject of laughter. George Gissing. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

adj. of, pertaining to, or in the style of Victor Hugo. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

prop. a. suggestive of a statue.
Syn. -- statuesque. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

prop. a. [ fr. Franz Kafka, novelist; especially from his novels such as "The Trial". ] Frightening, threating, and bewildering in a vague and unexplicable way; -- of situations or regulations. Often used to describe illogical bureaucratic entanglements with no reasonable solution. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

prop. a. Of, pertaining to, or in the style of Rudyard Kipling. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

prop. n. A genus of low-growing hairy herbs, comprising some of the bladderpods.
Syn. -- genus Lesquerella. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. & n. See Moresque. [ 1913 Webster ]

{ , n. [ Sp. mezquite; said to be a Mexican Indian word. ] (Bot.) Aany of several small spiny trees or shrubs of the southwestern part of North America belonging to the genus Prosopis having small flowers in axillary cylindrical spikes followed by large sugar-rich pods, especially the honey mesquite, and screw-pod mesquite. [ 1913 Webster + WordNet 1.5 ]

Honey mesquite. See Algaroba (b). --
Screw-pod mesquite, a smaller tree (Prosopis pubescens), having spiral pods used as fodder and sometimes as food by the Indians. --
Mesquite grass, a rich native grass in Western Texas (Bouteloua oligostachya, and other species); -- so called from its growing in company with the mesquite tree; -- called also muskit grass, grama grass. [ 1913 Webster ]

. The pod or seed of the mesquite. [ Webster 1913 Suppl. ]

prop. adj. Of or pertaining to Michelangelo. [ WordNet 1.5 ]

a. [ F., fr. It. moresco, or Sp. morisco. See Morris. ] Of or pertaining to, or in the manner or style of, the Moors; Moorish. -- n. The Moresque style of architecture or decoration. See Moorish architecture, under Moorish. [ Written also mauresque. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ F., fr. Sp. picaro rogue. ] Applied to that class of literature in which the principal personage is the Spanish picaro, meaning a rascal, a knave, a rogue, an adventurer. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ It. pittoresco: cf. F. pittoresque. See Pictorial. ] Forming, or fitted to form, a good or pleasing picture; representing with the clearness or ideal beauty appropriate to a picture; expressing that peculiar kind of beauty which is agreeable in a picture, natural or artificial; graphic; vivid; as, a picturesque scene or attitude; picturesque language. [ 1913 Webster ]

What is picturesque as placed in relation to the beautiful and the sublime? It is . . . the characteristic pushed into a sensible excess. De Quincey. [ 1913 Webster ]

-- Pic`tur*esque"ly, adv. -- Pic`tur*esque"ness, n. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Somewhat picturesque. [ R. ] [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ Sp. resco, from plata silver. ] (Arch.) Resembling silver plate; -- said of certain architectural ornaments. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Raphaelesque. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Like Raphael's works; in Raphael's manner of painting. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. [ F. romanesque; cf. It. romanesco. ] 1. (Arch.) Somewhat resembling the Roman; -- applied sometimes to the debased style of the later Roman empire, but esp. to the more developed architecture prevailing from the 8th century to the 12th. [ 1913 Webster ]

2. Of or pertaining to romance or fable; fanciful. [ 1913 Webster ]

Romanesque style (Arch.), that which grew up from the attempts of barbarous people to copy Roman architecture and apply it to their own purposes. This term is loosely applied to all the styles of Western Europe, from the fall of the Western Roman Empire to the appearance of Gothic architecture. [ 1913 Webster ]

n. Romanesque style. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. After the manner of sculpture; resembling, or relating to, sculpture. [ 1913 Webster ]

‖ [ L., one half more, one and a half. ] (Chem.) A combining form (also used adjectively) denoting that three atoms or equivalents of the substance to the name of which it is prefixed are combined with two of some other element or radical; as, sesquibromide, sesquicarbonate, sesquichloride, sesquioxide. [ 1913 Webster ]

☞ Sesquidupli- is sometimes, but rarely, used in the same manner to denote the proportions of two and a half to one, or rather of five to two. [ 1913 Webster ]

a. Sesquialteral. [ 1913 Webster ]