'Flourishes' definitions:

Definition of 'Flourishes'

From: GCIDE
  • Flourish \Flour"ish\, n.; pl. Flourishes.
  • 1. A flourishing condition; prosperity; vigor. [Archaic] [1913 Webster]
  • The Roman monarchy, in her highest flourish, never had the like. --Howell. [1913 Webster]
  • 2. Decoration; ornament; beauty. [1913 Webster]
  • The flourish of his sober youth Was the pride of naked truth. --Crashaw. [1913 Webster]
  • 3. Something made or performed in a fanciful, wanton, or vaunting manner, by way of ostentation, to excite admiration, etc.; ostentatious embellishment; ambitious copiousness or amplification; parade of words and figures; show; as, a flourish of rhetoric or of wit. [1913 Webster]
  • He lards with flourishes his long harangue. --Dryden. [1913 Webster]
  • 4. A fanciful stroke of the pen or graver; a merely decorative figure. [1913 Webster]
  • The neat characters and flourishes of a Bible curiously printed. --Boyle. [1913 Webster]
  • 5. A fantastic or decorative musical passage; a strain of triumph or bravado, not forming part of a regular musical composition; a cal; a fanfare. [1913 Webster]
  • A flourish, trumpets! strike alarum, drums! --Shak. [1913 Webster]
  • 6. The waving of a weapon or other thing; a brandishing; as, the flourish of a sword. [1913 Webster]

Words containing 'Flourishes'