alabaster

See also: Alabaster

English

WOTD – 10 September 2009

A lamp whose shade has been crafted from alabaster.

Alternative forms

alabastre (obsolete)
alablaster (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle English alabastre, from Old French alabastre, from Latin alabaster (“box for perfume made of alabaster”), from Ancient Greek ἀλάβαστρος (alábastros), from earlier ἀλάβαστος (alábastos, “vase made of alabaster”). This may further derive from Egyptian ꜥj-r-bꜣstjt (“vessel of the Egyptian goddess Bast”). The Latin suffix -aster is unrelated, but may have influenced the spelling of the borrowing from Ancient Greek (whence a direct loan could have been rendered as *alabastrus).

Pronunciation

(UK) IPA^(key): /ˈæl.əˌbɑːs.tə/, /ˈæl.əˌbæs.tə/
(US) IPA^(key): /ˈæl.əˌbæs.tɚ/
Audio (US) (file)
Audio (AU) (file)
Rhymes: -ɑːstə(ɹ), -æstə(ɹ)

Noun

alabaster (usually uncountable, plural alabasters)

A fine-grained white or lightly-tinted variety of gypsum, used ornamentally.
- c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act I, scene i], lines 89–90, page 163:
  Why ſhould a man whoſe bloud is warme within,
  Sit like his Grandſire, cut in Alabaſter?
- 1867, Dante Alghieri, “Paradiso”, in Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, transl., The Divine Comedy‎, Canto XV, lines 22–23:
  Nor was the flame dissevered from its ribbon
  But like a radiant fillet ran along
  So that fire seemed it behind alabaster.
- 1915 May 15, “Egyptian Antiquities for Metropolitan”, in The New York Times‎ (PDF), archived from the original on 2015-09-14:
  One of the striking relics found at the tomb, was a Canopic portrait head of Queen Tii, made entirely of alabaster except the eyes and eyebrows, which were inlaid lapis lazuli and osidian.
(historical) A variety of calcite, translucent and sometimes banded.
(color) An off-white colour, like that of alabaster.
alabaster:

Derived terms

Nottingham alabaster

Translations

variety of gypsum

Arabic: please add this translation if you can
Armenian: ալեբաստր (hy) (alebastr)
Bulgarian: алабастър (alabastǎr)
Catalan: alabastre (ca) m
Chinese:
Mandarin: please add this translation if you can
Danish: alabast n or c
Dutch: albast (nl) n
Egyptian:

(šs m)
Esperanto: alabastro (eo)
Finnish: alabasteri (fi)
French: albâtre (fr) m
Georgian: please add this translation if you can
German: Alabaster (de) m
Greek: αλάβαστρο (el) n (alávastro)
Ancient: ἀλάβαστρον n (alábastron)
Hebrew: בהט‎ m (báhat)
Hungarian: alabástrom (hu)
Indonesian: albas (id)
Irish: albastar m
Italian: alabastro (it) m
Japanese: 雪花石膏 (せっかせっこう, sekka sekkō)
Kalmyk: җуңшу (jungshu)
Kazakh: алебастр (alebastr)
Korean: 설화석고 (ko) (seolhwaseokgo)
Latin: alabaster m
Middle English: alabastre
Norwegian:
Bokmål: alabast (no) m
Nynorsk: alabast m
Persian: please add this translation if you can
Polish: alabaster (pl) m
Portuguese: alabastro (pt) m
Romanian: alabastru (ro) n
Russian: алеба́стр (ru) m (alebástr)
Serbo-Croatian: alabaster (sh) m
Spanish: alabastro (es) m
Swedish: alabaster (sv) c
Tagalog: alabastro (tl)
Thai: please add this translation if you can
Turkish: kaymak taşı (tr)
Vietnamese: please add this translation if you can
Yoruba: alabásítà

Adjective

alabaster (not comparable)

Made of alabaster.
The crown is stored in an alabaster box with an onyx handle and a gold lock.
- 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981, Mark 14:3:
  And being in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at meat, there came a woman having an alabaster box of ointment of spikenard very precious; and she brake the box, and poured it on his head.
- 1980, Colin Thubron, Seafarers: The Venetians, page 41:
  An enameled miniature of Christ is set in the center of a jeweled alabaster paten, the plate that holds the bread during Communion services.
Resembling alabaster: white, pale, translucent.
An ominous alabaster fog settled in the valley.
- 1594, William Shakespeare, Lucrece (First Quarto), London: […] Richard Field, for Iohn Harrison, […], OCLC 236076664, lines 418-420:
  With more than admiration he admir’d
  Her azure veins, her alabaster skin,
  Her coral lips, her snow-white dimpled chin.
- a. 1887 (date written), Emily Dickinson, “[Book IV.—Time and Eternity] Safe in Their Alabaster Chambers”, in Mabel Loomis Todd and T[homas] W[entworth] Higginson, editors, Poems, First Series, Boston, Mass.: Roberts Brothers, published 1890, OCLC 1001812663, page 113:
  Safe in their alabaster chambers
  Untouched by morning, untouched by noon
  Sleep the meek members of the resurrection,
  Rafters of satin, and roof of stone.
- 1895, Katharine Lee Bates (lyrics), Samuel A. Ward (music), “America the Beautiful”:
  Thine alabaster cities gleam
  Undimmed by human tears!

Translations

made of alabaster

Armenian: ալեբաստրե (hy) (alebastre)
Catalan: alabastrí
Dutch: albasten (nl)
Esperanto: alabastra (eo)
Finnish: alabasteri- (fi), alabasterinen
German: alabastern (de)
Greek: αλαβάστρινος (el) (alavástrinos)
Hungarian: alabástrom (hu)
Polish: alabastrowy (pl)
Russian: алеба́стровый (ru) (alebástrovyj)

Anagrams

alabastre

Latin

Alternative forms

alabastrum

Etymology

Borrowed from Ancient Greek ἀλάβαστρος (alábastros), from earlier ἀλάβαστος (alábastos, “vase made of alabaster”).

Pronunciation

(Classical) IPA^(key): /a.laˈbas.ter/, [äɫ̪äˈbäs̠t̪ɛr]

(Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /a.laˈbas.ter/, [äläˈbäst̪er]

Noun

alabaster m (genitive alabastrī); second declension

a box, tapering to a point at the top, for perfumes or unguents

Declension

Second-declension noun (nominative singular in -er).

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	alabaster	alabastrī
Genitive	alabastrī	alabastrōrum
Dative	alabastrō	alabastrīs
Accusative	alabastrum	alabastrōs
Ablative	alabastrō	alabastrīs
Vocative	alabaster	alabastrī

Descendants

Catalan: alabastre
→ English: alabaster
- → Irish: albastar
Italian: alabastro
Old French: alabastre, aubastre
- Middle French: albastre
  - French: albâtre
→ Old Polish: alabaster, alabastyr (learned)
- Polish: alabaster, alabastr
→ Portuguese: alabastro
Romanian: alabastru
Spanish: alabastro

References

“alabaster”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
alabaster in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette
“alabaster”, in The Perseus Project (1999) Perseus Encyclopedia‎

Middle English

Noun

alabaster

Alternative form of alabastre

Old Polish

Alternative forms

alabastyr

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin alabaster, from Ancient Greek ἀλάβαστρος (alábastros).[1] First attested in 1419.

Noun

alabaster m

alabaster

Derived terms

adjective

alabastrowy

Descendants

Polish: alabaster (obsolete), alabastr

References

Andrzej Bańkowski (2000) Etymologiczny słownik języka polskiego‎ (in Polish)

K. Nitsch, editor (1953), “(Alabaster) Alabastyr”, in Słownik staropolski (in Old Polish), volume 1, Warsaw: Polish Academy of Sciences, page 22

Polish

Alternative forms

alabastr (obsolete)

Etymology

Inherited from Old Polish alabaster, from Latin alabaster, from Ancient Greek ἀλάβαστρος (alábastros).[1] First attested in 1419.[2]

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /a.laˈbas.tɛr/
Audio (file)
Rhymes: -astɛr
Syllabification: a‧la‧bas‧ter

Noun

alabaster m inan

(mineralogy) alabaster (fine-grained white or lightly-tinted variety of gypsum)
kopalnia alabastru ― an alabaster mine
(zrobiony, wykonany) z alabastru ― (made) of/from/out of alabaster
alabaster object

Declension

Declension of alabaster

	singular	plural
nominative	alabaster	alabastry
genitive	alabastru	alabastrów
dative	alabastrowi	alabastrom
accusative	alabaster	alabastry
instrumental	alabastrem	alabastrami
locative	alabastrze	alabastrach
vocative	alabastrze	alabastry

Derived terms

adjective

alabastrowy

adverb

alabastrowo

nouns

alabastron
alabastrowość

Related terms

noun

alabastron

References

Andrzej Bańkowski (2000) Etymologiczny słownik języka polskiego‎ (in Polish)
K. Nitsch, editor (1953), “(Alabaster) Alabastyr”, in Słownik staropolski (in Old Polish), volume 1, Warsaw: Polish Academy of Sciences, page 22

Pęzik, Piotr; Przepiórkowski, A.; Bańko, M.; Górski, R.; Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, B (2012) Wyszukiwarka PELCRA dla danych NKJP. Narodowy Korpus Języka Polskiego [National Polish Language Corpus, PELCRA search engine]‎, Wydawnictwo PWN

Serbo-Croatian

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin alabaster.

Noun

alabaster m (Cyrillic spelling алабастер)

alabaster
Synonyms: alabastar, ubjel

Swedish

Noun

alabaster c

alabaster

Declension

Declension of alabaster
	Uncountable
	Indefinite	Definite
Nominative	alabaster	alabastern	—	—
Genitive	alabasters	alabasterns	—	—

References

alabaster in Svensk ordbok (SO)
alabaster in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
alabaster in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)

[1] Andrzej Bańkowski (2000) Etymologiczny słownik języka polskiego‎ (in Polish)

[2] Andrzej Bańkowski (2000) Etymologiczny słownik języka polskiego‎ (in Polish)

[3] K. Nitsch, editor (1953), “(Alabaster) Alabastyr”, in Słownik staropolski (in Old Polish), volume 1, Warsaw: Polish Academy of Sciences, page 22

alabaster

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

Pronunciation

Noun

Derived terms

Translations

Adjective

Translations

Further reading

Anagrams

Latin

Alternative forms

Etymology

Pronunciation

Noun

Declension

Descendants

References

Middle English

Noun

Old Polish

Alternative forms

Etymology

Noun

Derived terms

Descendants

References

Polish

Alternative forms

Etymology

Pronunciation

Noun

Declension

Derived terms

Related terms

References

Further reading

Serbo-Croatian

Etymology

Noun

Swedish

Noun

Declension

References