fillet
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: fĭl'ĭt
ipa: /ˈfɪl.ɪt/
ipa: /fɪˈleɪ/
rhymes: -ɪlɪt
rhymes: -eɪ
Forms: form: fillets
form: filet
Etymology: From Middle English filet, vylette, felet, filette, flette, from Old French filet, diminutive of fil (“thread”), from Latin fīlum (“thread”).
Senses: examples: text: In secret shadow, farre from all mens sight:
 From her faire head her fillet she undight,
 And laid her stole aside.
ref: 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto III”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
text: A fillet binds her hair.
ref: 1713, [Alexander] Pope, Windsor-Forest. […], London: […] Bernard Lintott […], →OCLC:
text: "Know thy own worth, and reverence the lyre," is a line that should be as a fillet bound round the brow—a philactory embroidered on the garments of every son and daughter of Adam distinguished by the possession of that sacred gift, which, whether used or abused, applauded in itself or derided in its possessor, is the highest and the most inalienable distinction humanity ever has or ever can be gifted with, whether bestowed on the highest or the humblest being, in the great mass to which we all belong.
ref: 1838 (date written), L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XX, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], published 1842, →OCLC, page 252:
text: She was talking of Raymond Duncan, a walking absurdity who dressed in an ancient handwoven Greek costume and wore his hair in long braids reaching to his waist, adding, on ceremonial occasions, a fillet of bay-leaves.
ref: 1970, John Glassco, Memoirs of Montparnasse, Mew York, published 2007, page 42:
glosses: A headband; a ribbon or other band used to tie the hair up, or keep a headdress in place, or for decoration.
glosses: A thin strip of any material, in various technical uses.
topics: business
construction
manufacturing
glosses: A heavy bead of waterproofing compound or sealant material generally installed at the point where vertical and horizontal surfaces meet.
topics: CAD
computing
drafting
engineering
mathematics
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
sciences
glosses: A rounded relief or cut at an edge, especially an inside edge, added for a finished appearance and to break sharp edges.
examples: text: Fillet of a Fenny Snake, / In the Cauldron boyle and bake:
ref: c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i], page 143, column 2:
glosses: A strip or compact piece of meat or fish from which any bones and skin and feathers have been removed.
examples: text: fillet steak
glosses: A premium cut of meat, especially beef, taken from below the lower back of the animal, considered to be lean and tender; also called tenderloin.
topics: architecture
glosses: A thin featureless moulding/molding used as separation between broader decorative mouldings.
topics: architecture
glosses: The space between two flutings in a shaft.
topics: government
heraldry
hobbies
lifestyle
monarchy
nobility
politics
glosses: An ordinary equal in breadth to one quarter of the chief, to the lowest portion of which it corresponds in position.
glosses: The thread of a screw.
examples: text: Fairer than gods and naked as the moon, The foamy fillets at their ankles strewn Less marble-white than they
ref: 1911, George Sterling, The Swimmers:
glosses: A colored or gilded border.
glosses: The raised moulding around the muzzle of a gun.
topics: arts
business
carpentry
construction
crafts
hobbies
lifestyle
manufacturing
woodworking
glosses: Any scantling smaller than a batten.
topics: anatomy
medicine
sciences
glosses: A fascia; a band of fibres; applied especially to certain bands of white matter in the brain.
glosses: The loins of a horse, beginning at the place where the hinder part of the saddle rests.
Synonyms: sense: a boneless cut of meat
word: filet
Derived terms: chicken fillet
eye fillet
fillet knife
filletlike
fillet weld
green fillet
rolled fillet
Scotch fillet