agate definition | Dictionary.com

ag⋅ate

[ag-it]

–noun

1.	a variegated chalcedony showing curved, colored bands or other markings.

2.	a playing marble made of this substance, or of glass in imitation of it.

3.	Printing. a 5 ¹/₂ -point type of a size between pearl and nonpareil. Compare ruby (def. 5).

Origin:
1150–1200; ME ac(c)ate, achate, agaten (cf. D agaat, OS agāt, OHG agat), appar. < OF agathe or It agata (initial stress) ≪ ML achātēs < Gk ach

tēs

Related forms:

ag⋅ate⋅like, ag⋅a⋅toid, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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Link To agate

ag·ate (āg'ĭt)

A fine-grained, fibrous variety of chalcedony with colored bands or irregular clouding.
Games A playing marble made of agate or a glass imitation of it; an aggie.
A tool with agate parts, such as a burnisher tipped with agate.
Printing A type size, approximately 5 ¹/₂ points.

[Middle English achate, agaten, from Old French acate, agate, alteration (influenced by Greek agathē, good) of Latin achātēs, from Greek akhātēs.]

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Agate

A*gate"\, adv. [Pref. a- on + gate way.] On the way; agoing; as, to be agate; to set the bells agate. [Obs.] --Cotgrave.

Agate

Ag"ate\, n. [F. agate, It. agata, L. achates, fr. Gr. ?.]

1. (Min.) A semipellucid, uncrystallized variety of quartz, presenting various tints in the same specimen. Its colors are delicately arranged in stripes or bands, or blended in clouds.

Note: The fortification agate, or Scotch pebble, the moss agate, the clouded agate, etc., are familiar varieties.

2. (Print.) A kind of type, larger than pearl and smaller than nonpareil; in England called ruby.

Note: This line is printed in the type called agate.

3. A diminutive person; so called in allusion to the small figures cut in agate for rings and seals. [Obs.] --Shak.

4. A tool used by gold-wire drawers, bookbinders, etc.; -- so called from the agate fixed in it for burnishing.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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agate

1570, from M.Fr. agathe, from O.Fr. acate, from L. achates, from Gk. achates, the name of a river in Sicily where the stones were found. But the river could as easily be named for the stone. The earlier Eng. form of the word, achate (1230), was directly from Latin. Figurative sense of "a diminutive person" (1597) is from the now-obsolete meaning "small figures cut in agates for seals," preserved in typographer's agate (1838), the U.S. name of the 5.5-point font called in Great Britain ruby. Meaning "toy marble made of glass resembling agate" is from 1843 (colloquially called an aggie).

agate (āg'ĭt) Pronunciation Key
A type of very fine-grained quartz found in various colors that are arranged in bands or in cloudy patterns. The bands form when water rich with silica enters empty spaces in rock, after which the silica comes out of solution and forms crystals, gradually filling the spaces from the outside inward. The different colors are the result of various impurities in the water.

Agate

(Heb. shebo), a precious stone in the breast-plate of the high priest (Ex. 28:19; 39:12), the second in the third row. This may be the agate properly so called, a semi-transparent crystallized quartz, probably brought from Sheba, whence its name. In Isa. 54:12 and Ezek. 27:16, this word is the rendering of the Hebrew cadcod, which means "ruddy," and denotes a variety of minutely crystalline silica more or less in bands of different tints. This word is from the Greek name of a stone found in the river Achates in Sicily.

Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary
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