The word today is astrakhan which appeared on p 260 of The Houses in Between, by Howard Spring. This is a word I have been coming across for years and never looked up, knowing only that it had something to do with coats and hats. Since I read a lot of historical fiction, it must have been quite the rage at one time.
According the Webster's New World Dictionary, Third College Edition it is a noun meaning:
1. a loosely curled fur, made from the pelt of very young lambs originally bred near Astrakhan (a city & port in SW Russia, on the Volga River delta near the Caspian Sea.)
2. a wool fabric with a pile cut and curled to look like this.
So definition two would not exactly be a fake fur, but a man made wool creation similar to the real thing.
My sentence: His matching astrakhan coat and hat were inappropriate outer wear for Los Angeles but definitely gave him a Russian air.
"WORD OF THE DAY"
ReplyDeleteMy sentence: The activist was not sure if the woman's astrakhan jacket was the real thing or a fake, so he tossed red paint over it "just in case."
Signed,
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