a screen or mat covered with a dark material for shielding a camera lens from excess light or glare.
a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.
a calculus or concretion found in the stomach or intestines of certain animals, esp. ruminants, formerly reputed to be an effective remedy for poison.
a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.
an arrangement of five objects, as trees, in a square or rectangle, one at each corner and one in the middle.
late 13c., covent, from Anglo-Norm. covent, from O.Fr. convent, from L. conventus "assembly," used in M.L. for "religious house," originally pp. of convenire "come together" (see convene). Not exclusively feminine until 18c. The form with -n- emerged early 15c. The M.E.
form remains in London's Covent Garden district (notorious late 18c. for brothels), so called because it had been the garden of a defunct monastery.