chapelet

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From French chapelet. Doublet of chaplet.

Pronunciation

Noun

chapelet (plural chapelets)

  1. A pair of straps, with stirrups, joined at the top and fastened to the pommel or the frame of the saddle, after they have been adjusted to the convenience of the rider.
  2. A kind of chain pump, or dredging machine.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “chapelet”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

French

Etymology

Inherited from Old French chapelet, from chapel (“hat”) + -et.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ʃa.plɛ/
  • Audio:(file)
  • Audio (France (Vosges)):(file)
  • Audio (France (Somain)):(file)

Noun

chapelet m (plural chapelets)

  1. (obsolete) wreath (of flowers)
  2. (Catholicism) rosary, prayer beads
    • 1857, Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary […]‎[1], Paris: Michel Lévy Frères; republished as Eleanor Marx, transl., Madame Bovary, 1886:
      Vivant donc sans jamais sortir de la tiède atmosphère des classes et parmi ces femmes au teint blanc portant des chapelets à croix de cuivre, elle s'assoupit doucement à la langueur mystique qui s'exhale des parfums de l'autel, de la fraîcheur des bénitiers et du rayonnement des cierges.
      Living thus, without ever leaving the warm atmosphere of the class-rooms, and amid these pale-faced women wearing rosaries with brass crosses, she was softly lulled by the mystic languor exhaled in the perfumes of the altar, the freshness of the holy water, and the lights of the tapers.
  3. (also figuratively) string, hatful (of objects, ideas etc.)
    • 1857, Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary […]‎[2], Paris: Michel Lévy Frères; republished as Eleanor Marx, transl., Madame Bovary, 1886:
      Basse et couverte de tuiles brunes, elle avait en dehors, sous la lucarne de son grenier, un chapelet d'oignons suspendu.
      Low and covered with brown tiles, there hung outside it, beneath the dormer-window of the garret, a string of onions.
    • 2022 May 20, Guillemette Faure, “Ceux qui s’inquiètent du dérèglement climatique mais ne veulent pas arrêter l’avion : « J’attends avec impatience qu’on nous interdise de faire certaines choses »”, in Le Monde‎[3], →ISSN:
      Ils peuvent égrener la liste de tout ce sur quoi ils se sont restreints… et dérouler à la même vitesse un chapelet d’alibis qui justifient leurs prochains trajets en avion.
      They can rattle down a list of all their self-deprivations…and present with the same ease a string of alibis to justify their next flights.

Derived terms

Further reading

Old French

Etymology

chapel +‎ -et

Noun

chapelet oblique singular, m (oblique plural chapelez or chapeletz, nominative singular chapelez or chapeletz, nominative plural chapelet)

  1. small hat

Descendants

  • French: chapelet
  • → English: chapelet
  • → Middle English: chapelet
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