Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A white cloth or robe worn by an infant at baptism.
  • noun Archaic An infant wearing a baptismal robe; a baby.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun See chrism.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun obsolete A white cloth, anointed with chrism, or a white mantle thrown over a child when baptized or christened.
  • noun obsolete A child which died within a month after its baptism; -- so called from the chrisom cloth which was used as a shroud for it.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun obsolete A white cloth, anointed with chrism, or a white mantle thrown over a child when baptized or christened.
  • noun obsolete A child that died within a month after its baptism; so called from the chrisom cloth used as a shroud for it.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a consecrated ointment consisting of a mixture of oil and balsam

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English crisom, variant of crisme, chrisom, chrism; see chrism.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

See chrism.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word chrisom.

Examples

  • A linen cloth anointed with this oil, called a chrisom cloth, is laid upon the baby's face.

    Works of John Bunyan — Volume 03 John Bunyan 1658

  • If it dies within a month after these ceremonies, it was called a chrisom child.

    Works of John Bunyan — Volume 03 John Bunyan 1658

  • Incredible at a style, more explicit instrumentalities and intellectual charge, as an odoriferous chrisom, she anoints by the singular attars to the wisdom and the creative beauty.

    Nina Mindova author of poetry book"Secret feelings" 2008

  • Incredible at a style, more explicit instrumentalities and intellectual charge, as an odoriferous chrisom, she anoints by the singular attars to the wisdom and the creative beauty.

    Secret feelings - book from Nina Mindova 2008

  • After the baptism a piece of white linen cloth was placed on the head of the child, and remained there until the mother had been "churched" or purified; it was called the "chrisom cloth" and, if the infant died within a month, was used as a shroud.

    Excerpt: Shakespeare by Peter Ackroyd 2005

  • The place dripped radiance; was filling like a chrisom with radiance.

    The Metal Monster 2004

  • Only three days later, when he took part in the magnificent christening ceremony that named the child Elizabeth, he saw that the iron cross was pinned to the inside of the chrisom, the robe in which the child would be wrapped when she was taken from the baptismal font.

    This Scepter'd Isle Lackey, Mercedes 2004

  • Not knowing my true chrisom name, the stranger takes up my words an 'fits 'em to me.

    In Clive's Command A Story of the Fight for India Herbert Strang

  • What though its brow the chrisom lacked, I'd lift the golden pin,

    Spun-Yarn and Spindrift Norah Mary 1918

  • "Martin Luther, that false loon, Black Bullinger and Melanchthon" had been smothered in their chrisom-cloths and that St. Paul had never been born.

    The Age of the Reformation Preserved Smith 1910

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • Or, a silly person (gilly-gaupus, gawpus, dotterel)

    July 9, 2008

  • Anciently, a chrisom was the face-cloth, or piece of linen laid over a child's head when he was baptized or christened. The term has come to refer to a child who died within a month after its baptism—so called for the chrisom cloth that was used as a shroud for it. Wikipedia.

    September 19, 2009