farinaceous

farinaceous

English

Alternative forms

• farinacious (obsolete spelling)

Etymology

From Latinfarinaceus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˌfæɹəˈneɪʃəs/

  • Audio (Southern England)

    (file)

• Rhymes: -eɪʃəs

Adjective

farinaceous (comparative more farinaceous, superlative most farinaceous)

1. Made from, or rich in, starch or flour.
   • 1861, Charles Dickens, Great Expectations:

     Mr. Pumblechook's premises in the High-street of the market town, were of a peppercorny and farinaceous character, as the premises of a corn-chandler and seedsman should be.

   • 1870, Eustace Smith, On the Wasting Diseases of infants and children, Henry C. Lea (publisher), page 28:

     The very fact that the secretion of saliva in the young child does not become established until the third month after birth, seems to indicate that before that age farinaceous articles of diet are unsuited to the infant, as saliva is one of the most potent agents in the digestion of starchy foods.

   • 1895, Alfred Marshall, Principles of Economics, p. 208:

     As Mr. Giffen has pointed out, a rise in the price of bread makes so large a drain on the resources of the poorer labouring families and raises so much the marginal utility of money to them, that they are forced to curtail their consumption of meat and the more expensive farinaceous foods: and, bread being still the cheapest food which they can get and will take, they consume more, and not less of it […]

2. Having a floury texture; grainy.
   • 2007 May 22, Victoria Summerley, “It does us good to get our hands dirty”, in The Independent Online:

     In the Great Pavilion, the nurserymen and women have been employing their dark arts, too; coaxing agapanthus into bloom two months early, cosseting iris with wads of strategically placed cotton wool or touching up the farinaceous, fan-shaped fronds of a Bismarck palm with face powder.

Translations

Made from, or rich in, starch or flour

Irish: plúrach, plúrmhar Italian: farinaceo (it) Swedish: mjöl- (sv) Turkish: nişastalı (tr), unlu

Having a floury texture; grainy

French: farinacé (fr) Irish: plúrach, plúrmhar Swedish: grynig (sv), mjölig (sv)

See also

• farina

Anagrams

• neurofascia