Dictionary: AM'I-LOT – A-MONG', or A-MONGST'

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AM'I-LOT, n.

A white fish in the Mexican lakes, more than a foot in length, and much esteemed at the table. – Clavigero.

A-MISS', a. [a and miss. See Miss.]

  1. Wrong; faulty; out of order; improper; as, it may not be amiss to ask advice. [This adjective always follows its noun.]
  2. adv. In a faulty manner; contrary to propriety, truth, law or morality. Ye ask and receive not, because ye ask amiss. – James iv. Applied to the body, it signifies indisposed; as, I am somewhat amiss to day.

AM'I-TY, n. [Fr. amitié; It. amistà, amistáde; Sp. amistad, from amistar, to reconcile; Port. amizade; Norm. amistee, friendship, amez, friends, ameis, ametz, beloved. Qu. L. amo, amicitia.]

Friendship, in a general sense, between individuals, societies or nations: harmony; good understanding; as, our nation is in amity with all the world; a treaty of amity and commerce.

AM'MA, n. [Heb. אם, mother.]

  1. An abbess or spiritual mother.
  2. A girdle or truss used in ruptures. [Gr. αμμα.] – Coxe.

AM'MAN, n. [G. amtmann; D. amptman; Dan. amtmand; a compound of ampt, Sax. ambaht or embeht; office, duty, charge, and man. See Embassador.]

In some European nations, a judge who has cognizance of civil causes. In France, a notary or officer who draws deeds and other writings. – Encyc.

AM'MITE, or HAM'MITE, n. [Gr. αμμος, sand.]

A sand-stone or free-stone, of a pale brown color, very heavy, of a lax texture, composed of small round granules, cemented by an earthy sparry matter. The grit or granules are small stalagmites, composed of crusts or coats including one another. It is the roe-stone or oölite of recent authors. – Da Costa. Plin. 37. 10.

AM'MO-CETE, n.

An obsolete name of the ammodite. In Cuvier, the name of a genus of fish, including the lampern, Petromyzon branchialis, Linn.

AM'MO-CHRYSE, n. [am'mokris; Gr. αμμος, sand, χρυσος, gold.]

A yellow soft stone, found in Germany, consisting of glossy yellow particles. When rubbed or ground, it is used to strew over writing, like black sand with us. Qu. yellow mica. – Plin. 37. 11. Encyc.

AM'MO-DYTE, n. [Gr. αμμος, sand, and δυω, to enter.]

The sand eel, a genus of fish, of the Apodal order, about a foot in length, with a compressed head, a long slender body, and scales hardly perceptible. There is but one species, the Tobianus or lance. It buries itself in the sand, and is found also in the stomach of the porpess, which indicates that the latter fish roots up the sand like a hog. – Encyc. This name is also given to a serpent of the size of a viper, and of a yellowish color, found in Africa; also to a large serpent of Ceylon, of a whitish ash color, and very venomous. – Dict. of Nat. Hist.

AM-MO'NI-A, or AM'MO-NY, n. [The real origin of this word is not ascertained. Some authors suppose it to be from Ammon, a title of Jupiter, near whose temple in Upper Egypt it was generated. Others suppose it to be from Ammonia, a Cyrenaic territory; and others deduce it from αμμος, sand, as it was found in sandy ground. Anglicized, this forms an elegant word, ammony.]

Ammonia is an alkaline salifiable base, which is gaseous or aëriform in its uncombined state, and is composed of nitrogen and hydrogen. It is often called volatile alkali.

AM-MO'NI-AC, or AM-MO-IN'AC-AL, a.

Pertaining to ammonia, or possessing its properties.

AM-MO'NI-AC, or AM-MO'NI-AC-GUM, n. [See Ammonia.]

A gum resin, from Africa and the East, brought in large masses, composed of tears, internally white and externally yellow; an exudation from an umbelliferous plant, the Dorema ammoniacum. It has a fetid smell, and a nauseous sweet taste, followed by a bitter one. It is inflammable, soluble in water and spirit of wine, and is used in medicine as a deobstruent and resolvent. – Encyc.

AM-MO'NI-AN, a.

Relating to Ammonius, surnamed Saccas, of Alexandria, who flourished at the end of the second century, and was the founder of the eclectic system of philosophy; or rather, he completed the establishment of the sect, which originated with Potamo. – Enfield.

AM'MON-ITE, n. [Cornu Ammonis, from Jupiter Ammon, whose statues were represented with ram's horns.]

Serpent-stone, or cornu ammonis, a fossil shell, curved into a spiral, like a ram's horn; of various sizes, from the smallest grains to three feet in diameter. This fossil is found in stratums of limestone and clay, and in argillaceous iron ore. It is smooth or ridged; the ridges straight, crooked or undulated. – Cyc. Encyc. Plin. 37. 10.

AM-MO'NI-UM, n.

A name given to the supposed metallic basis of ammonia. It is a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen, containing a greater proportion of the latter than is contained in ammonia. If mercury, at the negative pole of a galvanic battery, is placed in contact with a solution of ammonia, and the circuit is completed, an amalgam is formed, which, at the temperature of 70° or 80° of Fahrenheit, is of the consistence of butter, but at the freezing point is a firm and crystalized mass. This amalgam is supposed to be formed by the metallic basis, ammonium. – Davy. Thomson.

AM-MO-NI'U-RET, or AM-MO-NI'A-RET, n.

A term once applied to certain supposed compounds of ammonia, and a pure metal. All of these have been ascertained to be salts composed of ammonia with an acid of the metal, which renders the term incorrect and useless.

AM-MU-NI'TION, n. [L. ad and munitio, from munio, to fortify.]

Military stores, or provisions for attack or defense. In modern usage, the signification is confined to the articles which are used in the discharge of fire-arms and ordnance of all kinds; as powder, balls, bombs, various kinds of shot, &c. Ammunition-bread, bread or other provisions to supply troops.

AM'NES-TY, n. [Gr. αμνηστια, of α neg. and μνησις, memory, from the root of mens, mind. See Mind.]

An act of oblivion; a general pardon of the offenses of subjects against the government, or the proclamation of such pardon. In medicine, the loss of memory from disease or old age. – Coxe.

AM'NI-OS, or AM'NI-ON, n. [Gr. αμνιον, a vessel or membrane.]

The innermost membrane surrounding the fetus in the womb. It is thin, transparent, soft and smooth on the inside, but rough on the outside. – Encyc.

AM-NI-OT'IC, a.

Relating to the liquor of the amnios.

AM-O-BE'AN, a.

Alternately answering. – Warton.

AM-O-BE'UM, n. [Gr. αμοιβαιος, alternate; αμοιβη, change.]

A poem in which persons are represented as speaking alternately, as the third and seventh eclogues of Virgil. – Encyc.

A-MO-LI'TION, n.

Removal.

A-MO'MUM, n. [Gr. αμωμον; Ar.حَمَامَا hamauma, from حَمَّ‎‎ hamma, to warm or heat; the heating plant.]

A genus of plants; all natives of warm climates, and remarkable for their pungency and aromatic properties. It includes the granum paradisi, or grains of paradise. – Cyc. True amomum is a round fruit, from the East, of the size of a grape, containing, under a membranous cover, a number of angular seeds of a dark brown color, in three cells. Of this fruit, ten or twelve grow in a cluster, adhering, without a pedicle, to a woody stalk. It is of a pungent taste and aromatic smell, and was formerly much used in medicine, but is now a stranger to the shops. – Plin. 12. 13. Encyc.

A-MONG', or A-MONGST', prep. [amung', or amungst'; Sax. onmang, ongemang, among; gemangan, to mingle; D. and Ger. mengen; Sw. mangia; Dan. mænger; to mingle; Gr. μιγνυω. See Mingle.]

  1. In a general or primitive sense, mixed or mingled with; as tares among wheat.
  2. Conjoined, or associated with, or making part of the number. Blessed art thou among women. – Luke. i.
  3. Of the number there is not one among a thousand, possessing the like qualities.