Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A structure, usually brick or stone, built against a wall for support or reinforcement.
- n. Something resembling a buttress, as:
- n. The flared base of certain tree trunks.
- n. A horny growth on the heel of a horse's hoof.
- n. Something that serves to support, prop, or reinforce: "The law is by its very nature a buttress of the status quo” ( J. William Fulbright).
- v. To support or reinforce with a buttress.
- v. To sustain, prop, or bolster: "The author buttresses her analysis with lengthy dissections of several of Moore's poems” ( Warren Woessner).
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A structure built against a wall, for the purpose of giving it stability.
- n. Figuratively, any prop or support.
- n. In farriery, an instrument of steel set in wood, for paring the hoof of a horse.
- To support by a buttress; hence, to prop or prop up, literally or figuratively.
- n. A wall or abutment built along a stream to prevent the logs in a drive from cutting the bank or jamming.
- n. The angle formed on the plantar surface of the hoof by the junction of the wall with the bar.
Wiktionary
- n. A brick or stone structure built against another structure to support it.
- n. Anything that serves to support something; a prop.
- n. A buttress-root.
- n. A feature jutting prominently out from a mountain or rock; a crag, a bluff.
- v. To support something physically with, or as if with, a prop or buttress.
- v. To support something or someone by supplying evidence; to corroborate or substantiate.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A projecting mass of masonry, used for resisting the thrust of an arch, or for ornament and symmetry.
- n. Anything which supports or strengthens.
- v. To support with a buttress; to prop; to brace firmly.
WordNet 3.0
- v. make stronger or defensible
- n. a support usually of stone or brick; supports the wall of a building
- v. reinforce with a buttress
Etymologies
- Middle English buteras, from Old French bouterez, from bouter, to strike against, of Germanic origin; see bhau- in Indo-European roots.
Examples
“Salvini, a noted Italian democrat, was right on the mark when he observed: "The widespread ignorance of events is the main buttress of injustice".”
“And when this policy seemed in danger of leading to regression as a result of electoral defeat, the commit ment to electoral (hence revisionist) activism was characterized as a buttress to the established theory of societal breakdown rather than as a major concession to revisionist ideology.”
“Close to this window, and rising up just above the sill of the clerestory windows, is a narrow, flat buttress, which is probably of the same date as the window.”
“To the right of the buttress is a long two-cusped lancet light; to the left may be traced, perhaps, the outline of an original round-arched window; while on both sides there are sloping lines in the masonry, as if there had been an acutely-pointed gable here.”
“The end of the buttress was a foot or two below the level of the leads, where Clara stood.”
“ChangeWave's survey results on dropped calls buttress the complaints made by iPhone users since Apple introduced the smartphone: AT&T's network performance is sub-standard.”
“Dr. LACEY: And in some cases, people even change what they eat, because many times, what you'll see in a person who's sleep deprived is they will tend to snack more on high-carb types of foods and snacks in order to kind of buttress their general energy level in an attempt to kind of self-stimulate and keep themselves more awake.”
“Where Shakespeare makes this the essential focus of his play (in which the revenge tragedy arc is merely a clothesline on which the rest hangs), the Nolans use it as a kind of buttress (though perhaps a central buttress) in a complicated plot made up mostly of action-adventure tropes.”
“We have found in the wall's western half two rectangular recesses on either side of a central "buttress" with a semicircular recess, still almost completely covered with red wall plaster (see restoration and conservation).”
“This kind of buttress was also used in the next, or Semi-Norman style.”
The Principles of Gothic Ecclesiastical Architecture, Elucidated by Question and Answer, 4th ed.
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘buttress’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
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Gene Wolfe
Please contribute your favorite words from any of Gene Wolfe’s books to this prize-winning list.
In case you come across words in this list which are too commonplace to fit in, please ...gallipot, roost, badelaire, oblesque, execration, dhole, amschaspand, arctother, chalcedony, penitence, asimi, autarch and 839 more...
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Any words List Its open!!
Im savin it for later
awesepoto
cooliest
sup
a-w-e-s-o-m-e
cool beans dude
hit me man
Rock on
Get a life dude
book timeweird, mongolian, 7457, saitin, toejam, aver, misanthrope, blandishment, cadge, fuschia, fuchsia, discotheque and 367 more...
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Hence
Words with definitions that have a "hence" in them.
hanger, Deet, tripe, spindlelegs, fiddle, store, pluck, snap, villain, link, comedy, particular and 376 more...
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Farriery
"The art of shoeing horses; also, the art of treating the diseases of horses, now technically called veterinary surgery."
--Century Dictionaryfarriery, crapaudine, grease, interference, cloy, buttress, grape, grapes, farrier, horseshoe, fullering, calk and 26 more...
sionnach Right. So I guess that mattress means female matter, address is a female adder, suppress a female supper, and that repress and redress are female reapers and readers, respectively. Feb 9, 2009
bilby Female butter. Feb 9, 2009
chained_bear Thanks, Weirdnet. Aug 24, 2008