Refine this word faster
White lead
Definitions
- 1 Tin, golden marcasite. obsolete, uncountable
"It is not amiſs here to give the differences betwixt white Lead, or Tin, Biſmuth, Tin-glaſs, or aſh-coloured Lead, and this common Lead, which they call black Lead;"
- 2 a poisonous white pigment that contains lead wordnet
- 3 A basic lead carbonate, particularly (historical) as once widely used for white paint, whitening cosmetics, and early medicine. uncountable
"The beginning of a new episode of work for Bradly was an agitated niggling over six-by-four squares of cardboard coated with size and white lead, prepared by himself to save an experimental waste of canvas."
Etymology
In the sense of tin, calque of Latin plumbum album (“tin”, literally “white lead”) already used before our era, as well as plumbum candidum (“tin”, literally “white-shining lead”) and Arabic رَصَاص أَبْيَض (raṣāṣ ʔabyaḍ, “tin”, literally “white lead”), distinguished from plumbum nigrum (“lead”, literally “black lead”) / رَصَاص أَسْوَد (raṣāṣ ʔaswad, “lead”, literally “black lead”), as tin and lead were improperly distinguished before modernity.
See also for "white lead"
Next best steps
Mini challenge
Unscramble this word: whitelead