Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- Of or pertaining to petrifaction.
- Having power to petrify or to convert vegetable or animal substances into stone.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Having the quality of converting organic matter into stone; petrifying.
- adjective Pertaining to, or characterized by, petrifaction.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Having the quality of converting
organic matter intostone ;petrifying . - adjective Pertaining to, or characterized by,
petrifaction .
Etymologies
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Examples
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(Protogaea, 1680), although he did not surmise how much time was needed for petrifactive processes to occur.
EVOLUTIONISM THOMAS A. GOUDGE 1968
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Anticipating the query, I said, "And these are the huge beasts of the earth, and the cattle of the third great period of organic existence; and yonder, in the same apartment, you see, but at its further end, is the famous fossil man of Guadaloupe, locked up by the petrifactive agencies in a slab of limestone."
The Testimony of the Rocks or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed Hugh Miller 1829
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It was covered with a bark of brittle coal, which is, however, wanting in all the fragments that have been preserved; and was resolved internally into a brown calcareous substance of about the hardness of ordinary marble, and very much resembling that into which the petrifactive agencies have consolidated the fossil trees of Granton and Craigleith.
The Testimony of the Rocks or, Geology in Its Bearings on the Two Theologies, Natural and Revealed Hugh Miller 1829
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