Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Joss \Joss\ (j[o^]s), n. [Chinese, corrupt. fr. Pg. deos God, L.
deus.]
A Chinese household divinity; a Chinese idol. ``Critic in
jars and josses.''
--Colman (1761).
Joss house, a Chinese temple or house for the Chinese mode of worship.
Joss stick, a reed covered with a paste made of the dust of odoriferous woods, or a cylinder made wholly of the paste; -- burned by the Chinese before an idol.
Wiktionary
n. A kind of incense burned before a Chinese idol.
WordNet
n. a slender stick of incense burned before a joss by the Chinese
Wikipedia
- REDIRECT Incense#Joss_sticks
Category:Religion in China Category:Objects used in Hindu worship
Usage examples of "joss stick".
He lit a joss stick of incense, muttered a prayer to Yi, the divine bowman in Chinese mythology, whom the Ghost had adopted as his personal deity.
She'll be lying on the bed with a joss stick burning to keep away the mosquitoes and she'll be looking at the pictures in an old Paris-Match.
I took several solitary, jet-lagged walks at dawn, when a city's ghosts tend to be most visible, but there was very little to be seen of previous realities: Joss stick smouldering in an old brass holder on the white-painted column of a shop-house.