arabesque

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A ballet position in which the dancer bends forward while standing on one straight leg with the arm extended forward and the other arm and leg extended backward.
2. n. A complex, ornate design of intertwined floral, foliate, and geometric figures.
3. n. Music An ornate, whimsical composition especially for piano.
4. n. An intricate or elaborate pattern or design: "the fluctuating shapes of a cloudscape, the complex arabesque of a camera movement, the blink of a character's eye” ( Nigel Andrews).
5. adj. In the fashion of or formed as an arabesque.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. Arabian or resembling the Arabian in style; specifically, in art, relating to or exhibiting the variety of ornament known as arabesque. See II.
2. n. A kind of ornament of a capricious and fanciful character, consisting of lines, geometrical figures, fruits, flowers, foliage, etc., variously combined and grouped, and painted, inlaid, or wrought in low relief: used especially for the decoration of walls and ceilings, but also for the decoration of objects of any nature. In the arabesques of the Mohammedans animal forms were rigidly excluded, in accordance with the requirements of their religious law; but the Greeks and Romans, and the Renaissance artists, among them Raphael and his scholars, to whom are due the rich arabesque decorations of the loggie of the Vatican, laid all the kingdoms of nature under contribution. The Greeks undoubtedly derived the idea of pictorial or plastic ornament of this kind from the Oriental stuffs, painted, woven, or embroidered with natural or fabulous forms of plants and animals, which were brought to them by Phenician traders from a very early period.
3. n. In bookbinding, a term used in England for impressed ornamental work on the side of the binding, produced by the pressure of hot plates or rollers upon which the pattern is engraved.
4. n. Also spelled arabesk.
5. To enrich with ornament in arabesque.

Wiktionary

1. n. An elaborate design of intertwined floral figures or complex geometrical patterns. This ornamental design is mainly used in Islamic Art and architecture.
2. n. music An ornate composition, especially for the piano.
3. n. ballet A dance position in which the dancer stands on one leg, with the other raised backwards, and the arms outstretched.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. A style of ornamentation either painted, inlaid, or carved in low relief. It consists of a pattern in which plants, fruits, foliage, etc., as well as figures of men and animals, real or imaginary, are fantastically interlaced or put together.
2. adj. obsolete Arabian.
3. adj. Relating to, or exhibiting, the style of ornament called arabesque.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. position in which the dancer has one leg raised behind and arms outstretched in a conventional pose
2. n. an ornament that interlaces simulated foliage in an intricate design