favillous

English

Etymology

From Latin favilla (“sparkling or glowing ashes”) + -ous.

Adjective

favillous (comparative more favillous, superlative most favillous)

1. (obsolete, rare) Of or pertaining to ashes.
   • 1650, Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], →OCLC:

     But of lower consideration is the common foretelling of strangers, from the fungous parcels about the weeks of Candles: which only signifieth a moist and pluvious ayre about them, hindering the avolation of the light and favillous particles; whereupon they are forced to settle upon the snast.

   • 1818 June, “A Description of the Hot Springs, near the river Washitaw, and of the Physical Geography of the adjacent country”, in The American Monthly Magazine and Critical Review, volume 3, number 2, page 86:

     The rocks and stones generally upon the hills, are extremely ragged and favillous, vast bodies of them, in many instances, having the appearance of being composed entirely of the calcarious matter once held in solution by the hot water of the springs.

   • 1902 May 12, “Hundreds Dead in St. Vincent”, in The New York Times, volume LI, number 16332, New York, page 1:

     The great noises, united in one continuous roar all the evening and through the night to Thursday morning, with the black rain, falling dust, and favillous scoriae, and with the midnight darkness all Wednesday, created feelings of fear and anxious suspense.

References

• “favillous”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.