inlay

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. To set (pieces of wood or ivory, for example) into a surface, usually at the same level, to form a design.
2. v. To decorate by setting in such designs.
3. v. To insert (a photograph, for example) within a mat in a book.
4. n. Contrasting material set into a surface in pieces to form a design.
5. n. A design, pattern, or decoration made by inlaying.
6. n. Dentistry A solid filling, as of gold or porcelain, fitted to a cavity in a tooth and cemented into place.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. To lay in, as a hiding-place; conceal.
2. To lay in; provide; store up.
3. To lay or insert in something; fix into or upon something, as for ornamentation.
4. To decorate with ornamental materials laid in a common groundwork; ornament with inserted work: as, to inlay a cabinet with ivory or ebony; an inlaid table.
5. n. That which is inserted or laid in something else, especially for the production of ornamental effect.
6. n. An ornamental design produced by inlaying one material in another, or by inserting several materials in combination, as in a mosaic.

Wiktionary

1. n. The material placed within a different material in the form of decoration.
2. v. To place pieces of a foreign material within another material to form a decorative design.
3. v. dentistry To fill a tooth.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. v. To lay within; hence, to insert, as pieces of pearl, ivory, mother-of-pearl, choice woods, or the like, in a groundwork of some other material; to form an ornamental surface; to diversify or adorn with insertions.
2. n. Matter or pieces of wood, ivory, etc., inlaid, or prepared for inlaying; that which is inserted or inlaid for ornament or variety.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. (dentistry) a filling consisting of a solid substance (as gold or porcelain) fitted to a cavity in a tooth and cemented into place
2. v. decorate the surface of by inserting wood, stone, and metal
3. n. a decoration made by fitting pieces of wood into prepared slots in a surface