[sham-ee; Fr. sha-mwah] 
noun, plural cham⋅ois, cham⋅oix [sham-eez; Fr. sha-mwah] , verb, cham⋅oised [sham-eed] , cham⋅ois⋅ing [sham-ee-ing] .| 1. | an agile, goatlike antelope, Rupicapra rupicapra, of high mountains of Europe: now rare in some areas. |
| 2. | a soft, pliable leather from any of various skins dressed with oil, esp. fish oil, originally prepared from the skin of the chamois. |
| 3. | a piece of this leather. |
| 4. | a cotton cloth finished to simulate this leather. |
| 5. | a medium to grayish yellow color. |
| 6. | to dress (a pelt) with oil in order to produce a chamois. |
| 7. | to rub or buff with a chamois. |
| cham·ois (shām'ē) n. pl. cham·ois (shām'ēz)
[French, from Old French, from Late Latin camōx.] |
Chamois
only in Deut. 14:5 (Heb. zemer), an animal of the deer or gazelle species. It bears this Hebrew name from its leaping or springing. The animal intended is probably the wild sheep (Ovis tragelephus), which is still found in Sinai and in the broken ridges of Stony Arabia. The LXX. and Vulgate render the word by camelopardus, i.e., the giraffe; but this is an animal of Central Africa, and is not at all known in Syria.
chamois
(species Rupicapra rupicapra), goatlike animal, belonging to the family Bovidae (order Artiodactyla), native to the mountains of Europe.
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