picture rod (pikturrod)

A rod attached horizontally to a wall near the ceiling as a support for pictures. Bra tubing was much used for this purpose; but the picture-rod has been largely superseded by the picture-molding. picturesque (pik-tu-resk'), a. [= F.pit to res que, Picturesque properly means what is done in the style and with the spirit of a painter; and it was thus, if I am not much mistaken, that the word was commonly employed when it was first adopted in England. D. Stewart , Philos. E ays, i. 5. We all know what we mean by the word picturesque as applied to real objects: for example, we all consider that a feudal castle or abbey, when it has become an ivied ruin, is a picturesque object. Encyc. Brit ., VII. 450. Measured by its hostility to our modern notions of convenience, Chester is probably the most picturesque city in He [the traveler] will mi the picturesque costumes to which he has become used further south. E. A. Freeman , Venice, p. 58. 7. In entom ., a colored pattern on a white or clear surface: generally used in describing the wings of Hymenoptera , Diptera , and Neuroptera . the world. Henry James , Jr., Trans. Sketches, p. 12. See pictura. Di ected picture. See di ect. - Easel picture. See easell. - Plane of the picture. Same as perspective plane (which see, under perspective ). : picturesque 2. Strikingly graphic or vivid; abounding or diversified with striking and vivid imagery: as, picturesque language. The epithet picturesque ... means that graphical power by which Poetry and Eloquence produce effects on the mind analogous to those of a picture. D. Stewart, Philos. E ays, i. 5. Where he [Dryden) is imaginative, it is in that lower sense which the poverty of our language, for want of a better word, compels us to call picturesque. Lowell, Among my Books, 1st ser., p. 64. picturesquely (pik-tū-resk'li), adv. In a pic turesque manner. picturesquene (pik-tu-resk'nes), n. The character of being picturesque. picture-writing (piktur-riting), n. 1. The use of pictures or of pictured representations in recording events or expre ing ideas; pictography: as, the picture - writing of the North American Indians. There was a period when art and writing were not divorced as they are at present, but so blended into one that we can best expre the union by such a compound as Picture - writing . C. T. Newton , Art and Archæol., p. 9. 2. A writing or inscription consisting of pictures or pictorial signs. picul, pecul (pik'ul), n. [Malay.] [Malay.] A weight in use in China and the East generally, containing 100 kin or catties, and equal to about 1334 pounds avoirdupois. By the Chinese it is called tan. cathes,