holystone
Pronunciation Noun
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Pronunciation Noun
holystone (plural holystones)
- (nautical) A piece of soft sandstone used for scouring the wooden decks of ships, usually with sand and seawater. [1823]
- A stone with a naturally-formed hole, used by Yorkshiremen for good luck. [1825]
- (sandstone used to scour ships' decks) bible
- (holed rock used as an amulet) lucky stone
- Russian: песча́ник
holystone (holystones, present participle holystoning; past and past participle holystoned)
- (transitive) To use a holystone. [1827]
- 1840, Richard Henry Dana, Two Years before the Mast..., p. 6:
- Six days shalt thou labour and do all thou art able,
And on the seventh—holystone the decks and scrape the cable.
- Six days shalt thou labour and do all thou art able,
- 1911: Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, s.v. "Sabbath":
- Six days shalt thou labor and do all that thou art able,
And on the seventh holystone the deck and scrape the cable.
- Six days shalt thou labor and do all that thou art able,
- 1840, Richard Henry Dana, Two Years before the Mast..., p. 6:
This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.003