Search the Dictionary

Pensive maditation; serious thoughtfulness. [Obs.] "Hail, divinest Melancholy !" Milton.

, remembered; hence, character, conduct, etc., as preserved in remembrance, history, or tradition; posthumous fame; as, the war became only a memory. The memory of the just is blessed. Prov. x. 7. That ever-living man of memory, Henry the Fifth. Shak. The Nonconformists . . . have, as a body, always venerated her [Eliz…

The spirit and traditions of military life. H. Spencer.

A collection or digest of Jewish traditions and explanations of Scripture, forming the text of the Talmud. [Written also Mischna.]

A great medieval German epic of unknown authorship containing traditions which refer to the Burgundians at the time of Attila (called Etzel in the poem) and mythological elements pointing to heathen times.

Uttered by the mouth, or in words; spoken, not written; verbal; as, oral traditions; oral testimony; oral law.

haddock; -- so called because the black spots, one on each side, behind the gills, are traditionally said to have been caused by the fingers of St. Peter, when he caught the fish to pay the tribute. The name is applied, also, to other fishes having similar spots.

g the Jews, noted for a strict and formal observance of rites and ceremonies and of the traditions of the elders, and whose pretensions to superior sanctity led them to separate themselves from the other Jews.

of finding, by means of a mine dial, the place where to sink an air shaft, or to bring an adit to the work, or to find which way the lode inclines.

racter. They tend to, and sometimes reach, a condition in which both representation and traditional decoration are entirely abolished and a work of art becomes a purely subjective expression in an arbitrary and personal language.

One who, in the time of Queen Elizabeth and the first two Stuarts, opposed traditional and formal usages, and advocated simpler forms of faith and worship than those established by law; -- originally, a term of reproach. The Puritans formed the bulk of the early population of New England.

The teachings and traditions of the rabbins.

One among the Jews who adhered to the Talmud and the traditions of the rabbins, in opposition to the Karaites, who rejected the traditions.

To allow, as a custom, tradition, or the like; to give credence or acceptance to. Many other things there be which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots. Mark vii. 4.

A formal demand made by one state or government upon another for the surrender or extradition of a fugitive from justice. Kent.

cious prelate will prefer a drop of the sincere milk of the word before vessels full of traditionary pottage resenting of the wild gourd of human invention. Fuller.

A Scandinavian legend, or heroic or mythic tradition, among the Norsemen and kindred people; a northern European popular historical or religious tale of olden time. And then the blue-eyed Norseman told A saga of the days of old. Longfellow.

A writer and doctor of the law; one skilled in the law and traditions; one who read and explained the law to the people.

A bard among the Highlanders of Scotland, who preserved and repeated the traditions of the tribes; also, a genealogist. [Written also senachy.] [Scot.]

- Shepherd kings, the chiefs of a nomadic people who invaded Egypt from the East in the traditional period, and conquered it, at least in part. They were expelled after about five hundred years, and attempts have been made to connect their expulsion with narrative in the book of Exodus. -- Shepherd's club (Bot.), the…