Definitions
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The wood of the shittah-tree, prized among the Hebrews, and, according to Exodus and Deuteronomy, furnishing the material of the ark of the covenant and various parts of the tabernacle. It is hard, tough, durable, and susceptible of a fine polish.
- n. A tree, Bumelia lanuginosa, of the southern United States, yielding a wood used to some extent in cabinet-making, and a gum, called gum-elastic, of some domestic use. The small western tree Rhamnus Purshiana is also so called.
Examples
“O fitting place and appropriate for a library, which was made of imperishable shittim-wood, and was all covered within and without with gold!”
“The other less, made of shittim-wood, all overlaid with pure gold, and a crown of beaten gold upon it, on which they were to burn pure incense unto the Lord always.”
“It is not, however, of porches of shittim-wood and of gold, that I mean to talk just now -- nor even of those elaborate architectural features which will belong of necessity to the entrance-way of every complete study of a country house.”
“As is said, (594) ‘thou shalt make a vail,’ etc., ‘and thou shalt hang it upon four pillars of shittim-wood, overlaid with gold,’ etc., and ‘thou shalt hang up the vail under the taches.’”
“On the east there was no board, but there were four pillars of shittim-wood.”
“Every day he took his little shittim-wood boats down to the water, tied strings to them, and let them float hither and thither on the crystal bosom of the tide.”
“Of all absurdities, this of some foreigner, proposing to take away my rhetoric, and substitute his own, and amuse me with pelican and stork, instead of thrush and robin; palm-trees and shittim-wood, instead of sassafras and hickory, -- seems the most needless. ”
“The stone furze ditches are scarcely bolder instances of the catachresis than the stone tables of shittim-wood.”
“Harrison, observed of Moses 'two _tables of stone_, that they were made of _shittim-wood_.”
“The ark was made 'of shittim-wood, two cubits and a half was the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘shittim-wood’.
-
The Aubrey/Maturin List I'm Gonna Mak...
I'm wading through Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin novels one by one, and someday, I'll wade through them again and list all the words I learned while reading them.
Edit: I started ma...studdingsail, carronade, mumchance, grumlin-futtocks, crosscat-harpings, holystone, sennit, orlop, orchitis, negus, kevel, altumal and 1112 more...
-
May or May Not Be Specific, But It's ...
This list will contain all non-excremental references to poo. See its ancestor list, Specific Excrement, which has generated no small amount of conversation (heated and otherwise) since its incepti...
fernando poo, a pooping sea, poop deck, clinchpoop, pimiento load, crappie, very reverend con..., pookimo, pootalian, kickapoo, skypoo, swheat-n-poo and 72 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for shittim-wood.
chained_bear "All we hope for to do now is to go quietly home with what we have, and if we get there we mean to build a tabernacle of shittim-wood for our chapel—you know our chapel, sir?"
--Patrick O'Brian, The Nutmeg of Consolation, 214 Mar 7, 2008