pall

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A cover for a coffin, bier, or tomb, often made of black, purple, or white velvet.
2. n. A coffin, especially one being carried to a grave or tomb.
3. n. A covering that darkens or obscures: a pall of smoke over the city.
4. n. A gloomy effect or atmosphere: "A pall of depressed indifference hung over Petrograd during February and March 1916” ( W. Bruce Lincoln).
5. n. Ecclesiastical A linen cloth or a square of cardboard faced with cloth used to cover the chalice.
6. n. Ecclesiastical See pallium.
7. v. To cover with or as if with a pall.
8. v. To become insipid, boring, or wearisome.
9. v. To have a dulling, wearisome, or boring effect.
10. v. To become cloyed or satiated.
11. v. To cloy; satiate.
12. v. To make vapid or wearisome.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. An outer garment; a cloak; a mantle.
2. n. Specifically — A robe put on a king at his coronation.
3. n. Same as pallium, 2.
4. n. Fine cloth, such as was used for the robes of nobles. Also called cloth of pall.
5. n. A curtain or covering.
6. n. Specifically— A cloth or covering thrown over a coffin, bier, tomb, etc.: as, a funeral pall. At the present time this is black, purple, or white; it is sometimes enriched with embroidery or with heraldic devices.
7. n. A canopy.
8. n. An altar-cloth.
9. n. A linen altar-cloth; especially, a corporal.
10. n. A linen cloth used to cover the chalice; a chalice-pall. This is now the usual meaning of pall as a piece of altar-linen. Formerly one corner of the corporal covered the chalice; the use of a separate pall, however, is as old as the twelfth century. The pall is now a small square piece of cardboard faced on both sides with linen or lawn. In carrying the holy vessels to and from the altar, the pall, covered with the veil, supports the burse, and itself rests on the paten and the paten on the chalice.
11. n. A covering of silk or other material for the front of an altar; a frontal.
12. n. Figuratively, gloom: in allusion to the funeral pall.
13. n. In heraldry, the suggestion of an episcopal pall; a Y-shaped form, said to be composed of half a saltier and half a pale, and therefore in width one fifth of the height of the escutcheon: it is sometimes, though rarely, represented reversed, and is always charged with crosses patté fitché to express its ecclesiastical origin. Also pairle.
14. To cover with or as with a pall; cover or invest; shroud.
15. To become vapid, as wine or ale; lose taste, life, or spirit; become insipid; hence, to become distasteful, wearisome, etc.
16. To make vapid or insipid.
17. To make spiritless; dispirit; depress; weaken; impair.
18. n. Nausea or nauseation.
19. To knock; knock down; beat; thrust.
20. n. See pawl.
21. n. In India, a small tent made by stretching canvas or cotton stuff over a ridge-pole supported on uprights.
22. n. See pal.

Wiktionary

1. v. to make vapid or insipid; to make lifeless or spiritless; to dull; to weaken
2. n. archaic fine cloth, especially purple cloth used for robes
3. n. Christianity a cloth used for various purposes on the altar in a church
4. n. a heavy canvas, especially laid over a coffin or tomb
5. n. obsolete nausea

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. Same as pawl.
2. n. An outer garment; a cloak mantle.
3. n. obsolete A kind of rich stuff used for garments in the Middle Ages.
4. n. (R. C. Ch.) Same as Pallium.
5. n. (Her.) A figure resembling the Roman Catholic pallium, or pall, and having the form of letter Y.
6. n. A large cloth, esp., a heavy black cloth, thrown over a coffin at a funeral; sometimes, also, over a tomb.
7. n. (Eccl.) A piece of cardboard, covered with linen and embroidered on one side; -- used to put over the chalice.
8. v. rare To cloak.
9. v. To become vapid, tasteless, dull, or insipid; to lose strength, life, spirit, or taste.
10. v. To make vapid or insipid; to make lifeless or spiritless; to dull; to weaken.
11. v. To satiate; to cloy.
12. n. obsolete Nausea.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. cause to lose courage
2. n. burial garment in which a corpse is wrapped
3. v. lose strength or effectiveness; become or appear boring, insipid, or tiresome (to)
4. v. cover with a pall
5. v. become less interesting or attractive
6. v. cause surfeit through excess though initially pleasing
7. v. cause to become flat
8. v. lose sparkle or bouquet
9. v. lose interest or become bored with something or somebody
10. n. hanging cloth used as a blind (especially for a window)
11. n. a sudden numbing dread