byssus

Estimated CEFR level: C2 — Proficiency

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

noun tuft of strong filaments by which e.g. a mussel makes itself fast to a fixed surface

Etymology

From New Latin byssus (“sea silk”), from Latin byssus (“fine cotton or cotton stuff, silk”), from Ancient Greek βύσσος (bússos, “a very fine yellowish flax and the linen woven from it”), from Hebrew בּוּץ (búts), Aramaic בּוּצָא (būṣā).

In classic literature

I returned to my room, clothed myself warmly—sea boots, an otterskin cap, a great coat of byssus, lined with sealskin; I was ready, I was waiting. — Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea, Jules Verne
Two enormous balneatores laid him on a cypress table covered with snow-white Egyptian byssus, and with hands dipped in perfumed olive oil began to rub his shapely body; and he waited with closed eyes till the heat of the laconicum and the heat of their hands passed through him and expelled weariness. — Quo Vadis: A Narrative of the Time of Nero, Henryk Sienkiewicz
Returning along the shore by the same path in the evening, when the tide had ebbed, he again saw Reynard in the same place, but lying quite dead, and, on examination, discovered that he was held fast by the tongue between the sharp shells of one of the basket-mussels, which are sometimes seven inches long, and adhere with intense strength to the rocks by the beard, known to the learned as a powerful byssus. — One of the Six Hundred: A Novel, James Grant

Synonyms

beard

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byssus

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