The Collaborative International Dictionary
Crystal \Crys"tal\ (kr[i^]s"tal), n. [OE. cristal, F. cristal, L. crystallum crystal, ice, fr. Gr. kry`stallos, fr. kry`os icy cold, frost; cf. AS. crystalla, fr. L. crystallum; prob. akin to E. crust. See Crust, Raw.]
(Chem. & Min.) The regular form which a substance tends to assume in solidifying, through the inherent power of cohesive attraction. It is bounded by plane surfaces, symmetrically arranged, and each species of crystal has fixed axial ratios. See Crystallization.
The material of quartz, in crystallization transparent or nearly so, and either colorless or slightly tinged with gray, or the like; -- called also rock crystal. Ornamental vessels are made of it. Cf. Smoky quartz, Pebble; also Brazilian pebble, under Brazilian.
A species of glass, more perfect in its composition and manufacture than common glass, and often cut into ornamental forms. See Flint glass.
The glass over the dial of a watch case.
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Anything resembling crystal, as clear water, etc.
The blue crystal of the seas.
--Byron.Blood crystal. See under Blood.
Compound crystal. See under Compound.
Iceland crystal, a transparent variety of calcite, or crystallized calcium carbonate, brought from Iceland, and used in certain optical instruments, as the polariscope.
Rock crystal, or Mountain crystal, any transparent crystal of quartz, particularly of limpid or colorless quartz.
Wiktionary
n. clear, colourless form of the silica mineral quartz, often called "''pure quartz''" or "''clear quartz''".
WordNet
n. a clear quartz used in making electronic and optical equipment [syn: transparent quartz]
Wikipedia
The Rock Crystal Egg or Revolving Miniatures Egg is an Imperial Fabergé egg, one in a series of fifty-two jeweled eggs made under the supervision of Peter Carl Fabergé for the Russian Imperial family. It was created in 1896 for Empress Alexandra Fyodorovna. The egg currently resides in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.
Rock Crystal (; 1845) is a novella by Austrian writer Adalbert Stifter, about two missing children on Christmas Eve. It influenced Thomas Mann and others with its "suspenseful, simple, myth-like story and majestic depictions of nature." Mann said Stifter is "one of the most extraordinary, the most enigmatic, the most secretly daring and the most strangely gripping narrators in world literature." Poet W. H. Auden called Rock Crystal "a quiet and beautiful parable about the relation of people to places, of man to nature."
It was translated to English in 1945 by Elizabeth Mayer and Marianne Moore, re-issued by Pushkin Press in 2001 and the New York Review of Books in 2008. An earlier translation from 1914 by Lee M. Hollander is in the public domain.
In 1949 (by Harald Reinl) and in 2004 (by Joseph Vilsmaier), it was adapted into German-language films " Bergkristall".
Usage examples of "rock crystal".
Owing to its thermal characteristics, Black Ballybran is a pigmented rock crystal, translucent in natural light.
Although the roof of the cave was high -- at least twenty feet -- the room was warm, and Niall realized that the source of the warmth was another rock crystal, this one shaped like a massive rough boulder that stood by a far wall and emitted an orange glow.
It stood upon a thick circular pedestal of what appeared to be cloudy rock crystal supported by hundreds of thick rods of the same material.
Cashel had already looked at the amulet by the light of the stars and the waxing moon: a lens of rock crystal whose silver mounting mimicked a spider lying on the disk and encircling it with her legs.
Big Hrandis poured wine from a ewer into the rock crystal cup waiting in front of Cashel.