The Collaborative International Dictionary
Nickel \Nick"el\, n. [G., fr. Sw. nickel, abbrev. from Sw. kopparnickel copper-nickel, a name given in derision, as it was thought to be a base ore of copper. The origin of the second part of the word is uncertain. Cf. Kupfer-nickel, Copper-nickel.]
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(Chem.) A bright silver-white metallic element of atomic number 28. It is of the iron group, and is hard, malleable, and ductile. It occurs combined with sulphur in millerite, with arsenic in the mineral niccolite, and with arsenic and sulphur in nickel glance. Symbol Ni. Atomic weight 58.70.
Note: On account of its permanence in air and inertness to oxidation, it is used in the smaller coins, for plating iron, brass, etc., for chemical apparatus, and in certain alloys, as german silver. It is magnetic, and is very frequently accompanied by cobalt, both being found in meteoric iron.
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A small coin made of or containing nickel; esp., a five-cent piece. [Colloq. U.S.]
Nickel silver, an alloy of nickel, copper, and zinc; -- usually called german silver; called also argentan.
Wiktionary
n. nickel silver
Wikipedia
Argentan is a commune and the seat of two cantons and of an arrondissement in the Orne department in northwestern France.
Argentan is located NE of Rennes, ENE of the Mont Saint-Michel, SE of Cherbourg, SSE of Caen, SW of Rouen and N of Le Mans.
Usage examples of "argentan".
Christmas court in Argentan, she had retired to her own ducal city of Poitiers.
Christmas court in Argentan, victorious Henry escorted the Countess of Poitou through her own domain as Louis had done before him, and left her at last in the deep south with a household purely Poitevin.
Then take him to Normandy and imprison him in Argentan, and flog him in the public squares of all the towns through which you pass.
When Henry had his servant brought to him from Argentan more dead than alive, he suffered an Angevin fury.
It is very possible that these concerned the removal of Marguerite from Argentan to Paris to bring forth her first born, not in Anjou or Normandy, but in the city of the Capets.
Bertran tried to engage the Duchess of Saxony, and is said to have followed her to Argentan after the Christmas court.
Frederick was apprised that the fugitives had entered his confines or were about to do so, he summoned one of his most trusted men, a certain Roger, a native of the Norman city of Argentan, who had been in his service for twenty years.
The Germans held stubbornly on to the jaws of the gap at Falaise and Argentan, and, giving priority to their armour, tried to extricate all that they could.
Another family, moved to Argentan, had left a notice for their three sons in case any should ever come back from the wars.
At Argentan I saw some rough Norman farmers enter the coaches, talking with the same good natured calmness as if they were going away on a business trip.
They camped in the mellow afternoon under the trees upon a rugged mountain that guarded the defile, through which a rushing torrent, one of the tributaries of the Oire, dashed over the rocks on its swift course to Argentan.