Dictionary: AL-LY' – ALMS

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AL-LY', v.t. [Fr. allier; reciprocal verb, s'allier, to match or confederate; from ad and lier, to tie or unite. L. ligo.]

  1. To unite, or form a relation, as between families by marriage, or between princes and states by treaty, league or confederacy.
  2. To form a relation by similitude, resemblance or friendship. Note. This word is more generally used in the passive form, as, families are allied by blood; or reciprocally, as, princes ally themselves to powerful states.

AL-LY'ING, ppr.

Uniting by marriage or treaty.

AL'MA-CAN-TAR, n. [See ALMUCANTAR.]

AL'MA-DIE, n.

A bark canoe used by the Africans; also a long boat used at Calicut, in India, eighty feet long, and six or seven broad; called also cathuri. – Encyc.

AL'MA-GEST, n. [al and μεγιστ, greatest.]

A book or collection of problems in astronomy and geometry, drawn up by Ptolemy. The same title has been given to other works of the like kind. – Encyc.

AL-MA'GRA, n.

A fine deep red ocher, with an admixture of purple, very heavy, dense but friable, with a rough dusty surface. It is the sil atticum of the ancients. It is austere to the taste, astringent, melting in the mouth and staining the skin. It is used as a paint and as a medicine. – Encyc.

AL-MA-MA-TER, n. [AL-MA MA-TER. L.]

Fostering mother; a college or seminary where one is educated.

AL'MA-NAC, n. [Ar. al and مَنَخٌ manach, manack, a calendar, or diary.]

A small book or table, containing a calendar of days, weeks and months, with the times of the rising of the sun and moon, changes of the moon, eclipses, hours of full tide, stated festivals of churches, stated terms of courts, observations on the weather, &c. for the year ensuing. This calendar is sometimes published on one side of a single sheet, and called a sheet-almanac. The Baltic nations formerly engraved their calendars on pieces of wood, on swords, helves of axes, and various other utensils, and especially on walking-sticks. Many of these are preserved in the cabinets of the curious. They are called by different nations, rimstocks, primstaries, runstocks, runstaffs, clogs, &c. The characters used are generally the Runic or Gothic. – Junius. Encyc. Tooke's Russia.

AL'MA-NAC-MA-KER, n.

A maker of almanacs.

AL-MAN'DIN, n. [Fr. and It.]

In mineralogy, precious garnet, a beautiful mineral of a red color, of various shades, sometimes tinged with yellow or blue. It is commonly translucent, sometimes transparent. It occurs crystalized in the rhombic dodecahedron. – Phillips.

AL'ME, or AL'MA, n.

Girls in Egypt, whose occupation is to amuse company with singing and dancing. – Encyc. Savary.

AL-ME'NA, n.

A weight of two pounds, used to weigh saffron in several parts of Asia. – Sp. Dict.

AL-MIGHT'I-LY, adv.

With almighty power. – H. Taylor.

AL-MIGHT'I-NESS, n.

Omnipotence; infinite or boundless power; an attribute of God only.

AL-MIGHT'Y, a. [all and mighty. See Might.]

Possessing all power; omnipotent; being of unlimited might; being of boundless sufficiency; appropriately applied to the Supreme Being.

AL-MIGHT'Y, n.

The Omnipotent God.

AL'MOND, n. [Fr. amande; It. mandola; Sp. almendra; Germ. mandel.]

  1. The fruit of the almond tree; an ovate, compressed nut, perforated in the pores. It is either sweet or bitter. [It is popularly pronounced ammond.] – Nicholson. Encyc.
  2. The tonsils, two glands near the basis of the tongue, are called almonds, from their resemblance to that nut; vulgarly, but improperly, called the almonds of the ears, as they belong to the throat. – Quincy. Johnson.
  3. In Portugal, a measure by which wine is sold, twenty-six of which make a pipe. – Encyc. [But in Portuguese it is written almude.]
  4. Among lapidaries, almonds signify pieces of rock crystal, used in adorning branch candlesticks, so called from their resemblance to this fruit. – Encyc.

AL'MOND-FURN-ACE, n.

among refiners, is a furnace in which the slags of litharge, left in refining silver, are reduced to lead, by the help of charcoal; that is, according to modern chimistry, in which the oxyd of lead is deoxydized and the metal revived.

AL'MOND-SHAP-ED, a.

Having the form of an almond.

AL'MOND-TREE, n.

A species of Amygdalus. The tree which produces the almond. The leaves and flowers resemble those of the peach, but the fruit is longer and more compressed, the green coat is thinner and drier when ripe and the shell is not so rugged.

AL'MOND-WIL-LOW, n.

A tree with leaves of a light green on both sides. – Mason from Shenstone.

AL'MON-ER, n. [See Alms.]

An officer whose duty is to distribute charity or alms. By the ancient canons, every monastery was to dispose of a tenth of its income in alms to the poor, and all bishops were obliged to keep an almoner. This title is sometimes given to a chaplain; as, the almoner of a ship or regiment. The lord almoner, or lord high almoner, in England, is an ecclesiastical officer, generally a bishop, who has the forfeiture of all deodands, and the goods of self-murderers, which he is to distribute to the poor. The grand almoner, in France, is the first ecclesiastical dignitary, and has the superintendence of hospitals. – Encyc.

AL'MON-RY, n. [Corrupted into ambry, aumbry, aumery.]

The place where the almoner resides, or where the alms are distributed.

AL-MOST, adv. [all and most. The Saxon order of writing was thus: “all most who were present." Sax. Chron. p. 225. We now use a duplication, almost all who were present.]

Nearly; well nigh; for the greatest part. Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian. Acts xxvi.

ALMS, n. [ämz; Sax. almes; old Eng. almesse; Norm. almoignes; Fr. aumones; D. aalmoes; Sw. almosa; Dan. almisse; G. almosen; L. eleemosyna; Gr. ελεημοσυνη. The first syllables appear to be from ελεεω, to pity.]

Any thing given gratuitously to relieve the poor, as money, food, or clothing, otherwise called charity. A lame man was laid daily to ask an alms. – Acts iii. Cornelius gave much alms to the people. – Acts x. Tenure by free alms, or frank-almoign, in England, is that by which the possessor is bound to pray for the soul of the donor, whether dead or alive; a tenure by which most of the ancient monasteries and religious houses in England held their lands, as do the parochial clergy, and many ecclesiastical and eleemosynary establishments at this day. Land thus held was free from all rent or other service. – Blackstone.