lac
/læk/ noun, proper noun
Forms lacs
- noun A resinous substance or lacquer produced mainly on the banyan tree by the female of Kerria lacca, a scale insect.
- noun Dated spelling of lakh.
- noun (medicine, colloquial) Laceration. “hand lac”
- proper noun A province of Chad.
- proper noun A surname.
Synonyms
Etymology
From Portuguese laca, from Hindi लाख (lākh)/Urdu لاکھ (lākh) or cognates in other Indo-Aryan languages, from Sanskrit लाक्षा (lākṣā). Doublet of lacquer.
From laceration.
From Cadillac.
Webster’s 1913
- noun One hundred thousand; also, a vaguely great number; as, a lac of rupees. [Written also lack.] [East Indies]
- noun A resinous substance produced mainly on the banyan tree, but to some extent on other trees, by the Coccus lacca, a scale-shaped insect, the female of which fixes herself on the bark, and exudes from the margin of her body this resinous substance.
Etymology [Hind. lak, lakh, laksh, Skr. laksha a mark, sign, lakh.]
Etymology [Per. lak; akin to Skr. laksha: cf. F. lague, It. & NL. lacca. Cf. Lake a color, Lacquer, Litmus.]
Sources: Wiktionary · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “lac”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details