In the 16th century, Turkish women could divorce their husbands if the man failed to keep his family’s pot filled with coffee.
BUTTRESS
buttress, buttressing
(noun) a support usually of stone or brick; supports the wall of a building
buttress
(verb) make stronger or defensible; “buttress your thesis”
buttress
(verb) reinforce with a buttress; “Buttress the church”
Source: WordNet® 3.1
Etymology
Noun
buttress (plural buttresses)
(architecture) A brick or stone structure built against another structure to support it.
Anything that serves to support something; a prop.
(botany) A buttress-root.
(climbing) A feature jutting prominently out from a mountain or rock; a crag, a bluff.
(figurative) Anything that supports or strengthens.
Synonyms
• counterfort
• brace
Verb
buttress (third-person singular simple present buttresses, present participle buttressing, simple past and past participle buttressed)
To support something physically with, or as if with, a prop or buttress.
(figurative, by extension) To support something or someone by supplying evidence; to corroborate or substantiate.
Anagrams
• betrusts
Source: Wiktionary
But"tress, n. Etym: [OE. butrasse, boterace, fr. F. bouter to push; cf. OF. bouteret (nom. sing. and acc. pl. bouterez) buttress. See Butt an end, and cf. Butteris.]
1. (Arch.)
Definition: A projecting mass of masonry, used for resisting the thrust of an arch, or for ornament and symmetry.
Note: When an external projection is used merely to stiffen a wall, it is a pier.
2. Anything which supports or strengthens. "The ground pillar and buttress of the good old cause of nonconformity." South. Flying buttress. See Flying buttress.
But"tress, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Buttressed (p. pr. & vb. n. Buttressing.]
Definition: To support with a buttress; to prop; to brace firmly. To set it upright again, and to prop and buttress it up for duration. Burke.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition
Recent Word Finds
Word of the Day
4 May 2025
CRISP
(adjective) (of something seen or heard) clearly defined; “a sharp photographic image”; “the sharp crack of a twig”; “the crisp snap of dry leaves underfoot”
Coffee Trivia
