rock oil
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of rock oil
1660–70; translation of Medieval Latin petroleum
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.
But by fracking the rock, oil flowed from the shale.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 8, 2014
In the late fifties Mr. George H. Bissell had become interested in rock oil, not as an embrocation and as a cure for most human ills, but as a light-giving material.
From The Age of Big Business; a chronicle of the captains of industry by Burton Jesse Hendrick
The oil mentioned in the next line, is that called the rock oil, petroleum, a black fetid mineral oil, good for bruises and sprains.
From The Lusiad or The Discovery of India, an Epic Poem by Luís de Camões
No. On all bearings the same oil, but on mainspring a rock oil.
From Friction, Lubrication and the Lubricants in Horology by William T. Lewis
I was hidden in cheap pink paper that smelt of rock oil.
From Ulysses by James Joyce
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.
