rose-water
(ˈrəʊzˈwɔːtə(r))
[f. rose n. + water n. Cf. MDu. rose(n)-, rooswater (Du. rozenwater), MLG. rosenwater, MHG. rôs(en)wa{zced}{zced}er (G. rosenwasser), MSw. rosenvatn (Sw. -vatten, Da. -vana).]
1. a. Water distilled from roses, or impregnated with essence of roses, and used as a perfume, etc.
| 1398 Trevisa Barth. De P.R. xvii. v. (Bodl. MS.), Men temper þe wyne wiþ rose water. 1456 Cov. Leet-bk. 292 He payde for a glasse of Rose water that my lord Ryvers had ij s. 1553 Eden Treat. Newe Ind. (Arb.) 17 Their Priestes washe the Image of the deuyll with rose water. 1594 Nashe Unfort. Trav. Wks. (Grosart) V. 37 Their nere bitten beardes must.. be dewd euerie daie with rose water. 1620 Venner Via Recta vi. 95 Orenges sliced and sopped in Rose-water and Sugar, are very good to coole..the stomacke. 1662 W. Gurnall Chr. in Arm. xi. 215/1 The Rose-water is not the less sweet, because one writes Wormwood-water on the glass. 1712 tr. Pomet's Hist. Drugs I. 111 It is of these Roses we make the best Rose-Water. 1782 F. Burney Cecilia vi. xi, After dinner you shall bathe them in rose-water. 1850 Thackeray Pendennis li, He..could scent his pocket-handkerchief with rose-water. 1856 Delamer Fl. Garden (1861) 141 A well-known type is the medical rose, grown..for the preparation of rose-water by distillers. |
b. With a and pl. rare.
| 1582 Lichefield tr. Castanheda's Conq. E. Ind. i. xiii. 33 So came they thether,..finding there..coralls, Rose waters, and all kinde of Conserues. a 1586 Sidney Arcadia (1622) 246 Haue you euer seene a pure Rosewater kept in a crystall glasse? how fine it looks? how sweet it smels? 1806 Med. Jrnl. XV. 70 A fragrant rose water is distilled from the root [of yellow rose-wort]. 1870 Emerson Soc. & Sol. vii. 133 We may yet find a rose-water that will wash the negro white. |
c. attrib., as rose-water bottle, rose-water bowl, rose-water dish, rose-water ewer, etc.; also rose-water pear (see quots. 1676, 1786); rose-water pipe, an oriental tobacco-pipe in which the smoke passes through rose water before reaching the mouth; rose-water still, a still for making rose-water.
| 1629 J. Parkinson Parad. iii. xxi. 592 The Rosewater peare is a goodly faire peare, and of a delicate taste. 1663 Boyle Usef. Exp. Nat. Philos. ii. ii. 79 Made by a bare distillation in a common rose-water still. 1676 Worlidge Cyder (1691) 214 The Rosewater-pear, the Shortneck,..are..very good table fruit. 1698 Fryer Acc. E. India & P. 248 Also Rose-Water Bottles, the best Water whereof is Distilled here. 1786 Abercrombie Gard. Assist., Arr. p. xii, Pears,..Principal Varieties... Summer Pears Ripe in August and September... Rose-water [etc.]. 1835 N. P. Willis Pencillings by Way II. xxi. 234 A string of beads in one hand, and a splendid narghilé, or rose-water pipe, in the other. 1869 Corporation & College Plate 6 The fashion of ewers and rose-water dishes was introduced from the East to Europe. Ibid., Rose-water Ewer. 1886 Cakes & other Good Things (ed. 2) 3 Rose-water Cake. 1898 Jeanes Mod. Confect. 263 Rosewater Ice. 1956 G. Taylor Silver v. 97 A rose⁓water dish of 1672 belonging to St John's College, Oxford. 1960 H. Hayward Antique Coll. 243/2 Rose⁓water ewer and dish or basin, used for finger-washing at table. 1968 Canad. Antiques Collector June 9/3 The rose water bowl or basin was like an enormous soup plate, 12 to 20 inches in diameter. It had an extra wide rim, two inches or more, around the slightly depressed center and was usually ornately decorated. |
2. fig. or in fig. context.
| 1590 Greene Never too late (1600) 8 Wetting Cupids wings with rosewater, and tricking vp his quiver with sweete perfumes. 1598 E. Guilpin Skial. (1878) 65 But I must..haue A blessing of Rose-water, ere I goe. 1830 Morn. Chron. 4 Aug., But for the 1500 killed and wounded..this would almost have been what Mirabeau said was impossible: a revolution of rose-water. 1870 Lowell Study Wind., Condesc. Foreigners Wks. 1890 III. 241 We do not ask to be sprinkled with rosewater. |
3. attrib. in fig. uses: a. Of language: Fair, flattering. rare—1.
| 1598 E. Guilpin Skial. (1878) 37 Come to the Court, and Balthazer affords Fountaines of holy and rose-water words... Nothing but cossenage doth the world possesse. |
b. Gentle, mild, sentimental.
| 1837 Carlyle Fr. Rev. ii. vi. i, It is not a Revolt, it is a Revolution; and truly no rose-water one! 1855 Mrs. Gaskell North & S. xv, ‘They are that,’ replied Mr. Thornton. ‘Rose-water surgery won't do for them’. 1872 Bagehot Physics & Pol. (1876) 213 This is no pleasant power, no ‘rose-water’ authority. |
c. Elegant, superfine.
| 1840 Thackeray Catherine iii, To paint such thieves as they are: not dandy, poetical, rose-water thieves; but real downright scoundrels. 1883 Cent. Mag. Sept. 738 Because you're not [rich], she will strike for one of them rose-water snobs on Algonquin Avenue. |
d. Pleasant, comfortable. rare.
| 1889 Gretton Memory's Harkback 21, I was to be cut adrift.., and sent to rough it among strangers in a new and anything but a rose-water life. |
Hence ˈrose-ˈwater v., ˈrose-ˈwatered, ˈrose-ˌwatery, adjs.
| 1600 Rowlands Lett. Humours Blood iv. 63 Mellfluuious, sweete Rose-watred elloquence. 1876 Sir R. F. Burton in Lady Burton Life II. (1893) 72 My language is not rose-watered. 1893 Edin. Rev. July 59 Literary revolutionists have rosewatered Catiline. 1902 G. B. Shaw Let. 20 June (1972) II. 277 The comparatively rose-watery part of it [sc. a situation in Mrs. Warren's Profession]. |