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porcelain. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
porcelain, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
porcelain in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
porcelain you have here. The definition of the word
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English
Etymology
Ming dynasty porcelains (sense 4).
Dresden porcelains (sense 4).
From Middle French porcelaine (“cowrie, wampum; china, chinaware”), from Old Italian porcellana (“cowrie; china, chinaware”), from porcella (“mussel or cockle shell used to hold pigments while painting”) from porco (“pig”) with -ella (suffix forming diminutives).
Pronunciation
Noun
porcelain (countable and uncountable, plural porcelains)
- (usually uncountable) A hard white translucent ceramic, originally made by firing kaolin, quartz, and feldspar at high temperatures but now also inclusive of similar artificial materials; also often (figurative) such a material as a symbol of the fragility, elegance, etc. traditionally associated with porcelain goods.
2012, Andrew Martin, Underground Overground: A passenger's history of the Tube, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 136:Any power rail needs to be well insulated from earth, to minimise current leakage, and so the two power rails on the Underground sit on curiously genteel and antique-looking porcelain pots.
- (usually uncountable) Synonym of china: porcelain tableware.
- (uncountable, obsolete) Synonym of kaolin: the kind of clay traditionally used in China to manufacture porcelain.
1599, E. de Sande, translated by Richard Hakluyt, The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of the English Nation, 2nd edition, volume II, page 91:[...] that earthen or pliable matter commonly called porcellan, which is pure white,... wherof vessels of all kinds are very curiously framed...
- (countable, now usually in the plural) An object made of porcelain, (particularly) art objects or items of tableware.
The museum has an extensive collection of rare Chinese porcelains.
- (countable, rare) Synonym of cowrie.
1601, Giovanni Botero, translated by Robert Johnson, The Trauellers Breuiat, or, An Historicall Description of the Most Famous Kingdomes in the World, page 104:
- (countable, obsolete or historical) Synonym of wampum: strings of shells, beads, etc. used as ornamentation or currency; the composite shells, beads, etc.
c. 1665, Pierre Esprit de Radisson, Voyages, 1885 edition, page 49:We mett severall gangs of men to our greatest disadvantage, ffor we weare forced to sing, and those that came to see us gave porcelaine to those that most did us injury.
- (countable, often capitalized) A kind of pigeon with deep brown and off-white feathers.
1855, The Poultry Chronicle, number 3, page 9:Those pretty spangled Toys [...] known by various names, as Porcelains, Hyacinths, Ermines, &c.
Synonyms
Hypernyms
Hyponyms
Derived terms
Translations
hard white translucent ceramic
- Afrikaans: porselein (af)
- Albanian: porcelan (sq) m
- Arabic: خَزَف m (ḵazaf)
- Armenian: ճենապակի (hy) (čenapaki)
- Asturian: porzolana f
- Azerbaijani: farfor, çini
- Basque: portzelana
- Belarusian: фарфо́р m (farfór), парцала́н m (parcalán)
- Bengali: চীনামাটি (bn) (cinamaṭi), কেত্তলিন (kettolin)
- Bulgarian: порцела́н (bg) m (porcelán)
- Burmese: ကြွေထည်ပစ္စည်း (krwehtanypaccany:)
- Catalan: porcellana (ca) f
- Chinese:
- Cantonese: 瓷器 (ci4 hei3)
- Hokkien: 幼瓷仔 (iù-hûi-á), 磁器 (chû-khì)
- Mandarin: 瓷器 (zh) (cíqì), 瓷 (zh) (cí)
- Czech: porcelán (cs) m
- Danish: porcelæn (da) n
- Dutch: porselein (nl) n
- Esperanto: porcelano
- Estonian: portselan
- Faroese: postalín n
- Finnish: posliini (fi)
- French: porcelaine (fr) f
- Galician: porcelana f, louza (gl) f
- Georgian: ფაიფური (ka) (paipuri)
- German: Porzellan (de) n
- Greek: πορσελάνη (el) f (porseláni)
- Hebrew: חַרְסִינָה (he) f (kharsina)
- Hindi: पॉर्सिलेन (pŏrsilen), चीनी का बरतन m (cīnī kā bartan), चीनी (hi) f (cīnī)
- Hungarian: porcelán (hu)
- Icelandic: postulín n
- Ido: porcelano (io)
- Indonesian: porselen (id)
- Ingrian: farfori
- Irish: poirceallán m
- Italian: porcellana (it) f
- Japanese: 磁器 (ja) (じき, jiki), 焼き物 (ja) (やきもの, yakimono), ポースレン (pōsuren), 陶磁 (とうじ, tōji)
- Kalmyk: шаазң (şaazñ)
- Kannada: ಪಿಂಗಾಣಿ (kn) (piṅgāṇi)
- Kazakh: фарфор (farfor), кәрлен (kärlen)
- Korean: 도자기 (ko) (dojagi)
- Kyrgyz: фарфор (farfor)
- Latin: porcellanus
- Latvian: porcelāns m
- Lithuanian: porcelianas m
- Luxembourgish: Parzeläin m
- Macedonian: порцела́н m (porcelán)
- Malay: porselin
- Manchu: ᠶᡝᡥᡝᡵᡝ (yehere)
- Mongolian: шаазан (mn) (šaazan)
- Neapolitan: purcellamma f
- Norman: porcélaine f (Jersey)
- Norwegian:
- Bokmål: porselen n
- Nynorsk: porselen n
- Occitan: porcelana (oc) f
- Ottoman Turkish: چینی (çini)
- Persian: پورسلین (fa) (porselin), پرسلن (porselan), سفالینه (fa) (sofâline), چینی (fa) (čini), بارفتن (fa) (bârfatan)
- Polish: porcelana (pl) f
- Portuguese: porcelana (pt) f
- Romanian: porțelan (ro) n
- Russian: фарфо́р (ru) m (farfór)
- Scots: cheenae
- Serbo-Croatian:
- Cyrillic: порцелан m, порцу̀ла̄н m
- Roman: porcelan m, porcùlān (sh) m
- Sinhalese: පෝසිලේන් (pōsilēn)
- Slovak: porcelán m
- Slovene: porcelan (sl) m
- Spanish: porcelana (es) f, loza (es) f
- Swedish: porslin (sv) n
- Tagalog: pamantingin
- Tajik: фарфор (farfor), фағфур (faġfur)
- Thai: เครื่องลายคราม (krʉ̂ʉang-laai-kraam)
- Turkish: porselen (tr)
- Turkmen: farfor, jäç
- Tuvan: шаажаң (şaajañ)
- Ukrainian: фарфо́р m (farfór), порцеля́на f (porceljána)
- Urdu: چینی مٹی f (cīnī miṭṭī)
- Uzbek: farfor (uz), chinni (uz)
- Vietnamese: sứ (vi), đồ sứ
- Welsh: porslen f
- Yakut: фарфор (farfor)
- Yiddish: פּאָרצעלײַ n (portselay)
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items (esp. dishware or objets d'art) made of porcelain
Verb
porcelain (third-person singular simple present porcelains, present participle porcelaining, simple past and past participle porcelained)
- (transitive) To coat with a porcelain enamel.
References
- “porcelain, n. and adj.”, in OED Online
, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 2006.
- “porcelain”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
- Krueger, Dennis (December 1982). "Why On Earth Do They Call It Throwing?" Studio Potter, Vol. 11, Number 1.
Further reading