Crossword clues for soapstone
soapstone
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Steatite \Ste"a*tite\ (-t[imac]t), n. [Gr. ste`ar, ste`atos, fat, tallow: cf. F. st['e]atite.] (Min.) A massive variety of talc, of a grayish green or brown color. It forms extensive beds, and is quarried for fireplaces and for coarse utensils. Called also potstone, lard stone, and soapstone.
Talc \Talc\, n. [F. talc; cf. Sp. & It. talco, LL. talcus; all fr. Ar. talq.] (Min.) A soft mineral of a soapy feel and a greenish, whitish, or grayish color, usually occurring in foliated masses. It is hydrous silicate of magnesia. Steatite, or soapstone, is a compact granular variety.
Indurated talc, an impure, slaty talc, with a nearly compact texture, and greater hardness than common talc; -- called also talc slate.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
n. (context geology English) a soft rock, rich in talc, also containing serpentine and either magnetite, dolomite or calcite vb. (context transitive English) To scrub with soapstone.
WordNet
Gazetteer
Wikipedia
Soapstone (also known as steatite, or soaprock) is a talc- schist, which is a type of metamorphic rock. It is largely composed of the mineral talc and is thus rich in magnesium. It is produced by dynamothermal metamorphism and metasomatism, which occurs in the zones where tectonic plates are subducted, changing rocks by heat and pressure, with influx of fluids, but without melting. It has been a medium for carving for thousands of years.
Usage examples of "soapstone".
On it, he had already set out four dining-room chairs, two torch, res, a circular Victorian bedside stand with a marble top, a pair of soapstone statues of fat naked ladies, and a lacquered Chinese-style Regency desk.
Scores of beautiful vases of alabaster, breccia, marble, and soapstone, wrought in some cases to the thinness of a modern china cup, suggest at once the protodynastic Egyptian bowls of diorite and syenite, and show that if the Cretan took the idea from Egyptian models, he was not behind his master in the skill with which he carried it out.
An old Yupik man was there with a cardboard box full of soapstone carvings.
D U S T T 0 D U S T 55 Pierce frowned at that and made a task of wiping imaginary condensation off the soapstone counter.
Everyone peered down at the object inside: a carefully carved fabrication of soapstone slabs and other pieces, stained black, and decorated with a hundred elaborations carved from onyx, jet and agate.
Their cooking utensils are stone, a sort of funny stuff like soapstone.
The witch emerged with a soapstone drop-spindle and a ball of greasy wool.
We had by that time agreed not to transmit anything suggesting madness on the part of Lake’s men, and it surely looked like madness to find six imperfect monstrosities carefully buried upright in nine-foot snow graves under five-pointed mounds punched over with groups of dots in patterns exactly those on the queer greenish soapstones dug up from Mesozoic or Tertiary times.
We had by that time agreed not to transmit anything suggesting madness on the part of Lake's men, and it surely looked like madness to find six imperfect monstrosities carefully buried upright in nine-foot snow graves under five-pointed mounds punched over with groups of dots in patterns exactly those on the queer greenish soapstones dug up from Mesozoic or Tertiary times.
He was in open sunshine, now, with shoulder-high plants about him and the huddled soapstone huts of the village in clear view ahead.
Filled as he was with the horrors and strangenesses discovered at the camp, he hinted that the pittings vaguely resembled those baffling groups of dots sprinkled over the primeval greenish soapstones, so hideously duplicated on the madly conceived snow mounds above those six buried monstrosities.
We did not mention, I think, their display of the same uneasiness when sniffing around the queer greenish soapstones and certain other objects in the disordered region-objects including scientific instruments, aeroplanes, and machinery, both at the camp and at the boring, whose parts had been loosened, moved, or otherwise tampered with by winds that must have harbored singular curiosity and investigativeness.
With the field glass we could barely make out what seemed to be sculptural decorations in horizontal bands - decorations including those curious groups of dots whose presence on the ancient soapstones now assumed a vastly larger significance.
Probably the smaller of the various greenish soapstones found by our expedition were pieces of such currency.
But actually, it turned out to be a pleasant region, with most of the modern magic conveniences like soda-water springs and scented soapstones for laundry.