imbricate
Americanadjective
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overlapping in sequence, as tiles or shingles on a roof.
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of, relating to, or resembling overlapping tiles, as decoration or drawings.
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Biology. overlapping like tiles, as scales or leaves.
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characterized by or as if by overlapping shingles.
verb (used with or without object)
adjective
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architect relating to or having tiles, shingles, or slates that overlap
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botany (of leaves, scales, etc) overlapping each other
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of imbricate
1650–60; < Late Latin imbricātus tiled with imbrices, shaped like such a tile or tiling, equivalent to imbric- (stem of imbrex ) imbrex + -ātus -ate 1
Vocabulary lists containing imbricate
"Against Nature," Vocabulary from the argument
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The leaves are small and imbricate, and are borne on flattened branches, which are apt to be mistaken for the leaves.
From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Slice 4 "Aram, Eugene" to "Arcueil" by Various
Sepals and petals colored alike, in three or more rows of three, imbricate.
From The Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States Including the District East of the Mississippi and North of North Carolina and Tennessee by Gray, Asa
Marsiliaceæ, 700 Sporocarps sessile beneath the stem; small, floating, pinnately branched, with minute imbricate leaves.
From The Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States Including the District East of the Mississippi and North of North Carolina and Tennessee by Gray, Asa
The spikelets are about 1/8 inch, imbricate, a sessile and a stalked one from the top of each joint, greenish or purple.
From A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses by Rangachari, K.
Flowers regular, 5-merous, the sepals imbricate in the bud, persistent.
From The Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States Including the District East of the Mississippi and North of North Carolina and Tennessee by Gray, Asa
The pronouncer told her it meant a genus of tropical Asiatic and Australian trees having pinnate leaves with imbricated petals.
From New York Times ● Jul. 9, 2021
Space travel was imbricated with science fiction, with dreams of heroic courage that continue to fuel unscientific fantasies.
From Scientific American ● Aug. 24, 2020
Volutes, asportation, imbricated, Mnemosyne and phthisic are a few of the others.
From Washington Post ● Sep. 10, 2015
I’ve been rummaging in my skull the past few days for the skeleton key that might spring open the interlocking chambers of rap phenomenon Kendrick Lamar’s intricate, imbricated, and self-implicating new album.
From Slate ● Mar. 19, 2015
Corolla perfectly or not at all papilionaceous, sometimes nearly regular, imbricated in the bud, the upper or odd petal inside and enclosed by the others, Stamens 10 or fewer, commonly distinct, inserted on the calyx.
From The Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States Including the District East of the Mississippi and North of North Carolina and Tennessee by Gray, Asa
Spikelets are closely imbricating in two series, sessile, solitary, the upper reduced to a small pedicel 1- to 2-flowered, the lowest few on the spike, imperfect, male or neuter.
From A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses by Rangachari, K.
The leaf-sheath is smooth, imbricating, 1/2 to 1-1/2 inches long.
From A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses by Rangachari, K.
Branches are many, short, crowded, densely clothed from the base with sessile, imbricating, much compressed deflexed spikelets.
From A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses by Rangachari, K.
The inflorescence consists of a solitary spike with closely imbricating spikelets.
From A Handbook of Some South Indian Grasses by Rangachari, K.
Flowers at the extremities of the branches, 1½ in. long, composed of numerous imbricating, scale-like petals, curving inwards, and coloured crimson.
From Cactus Culture for Amateurs Being Descriptions of the Various Cactuses Grown in This Country, With Full and Practical Instructions for Their Successful Cultivation by Watson, W.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
