Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
- adj. Hanging loosely; suspended: the pensile nest of the Baltimore oriole.
- adj. Having or building a hanging nest. Used of birds.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
- adj. Hanging down, suspended.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English
- adj. Hanging; suspended; pendent; pendulous.
from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Hanging; suspended; hanging and swaying; pendulous.
- Building a hanging nest: as, the pensile warbler.
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Examples
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They are compact and rather deep, half pensile, that is to say, partly slung between the branches of the fork to which they are attached by bands of vegetable fibres.
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Now in this palace he erected very high walks, supported by stone pillars, and by planting what was called a pensile paradise, and replenishing it with all sorts of trees, he rendered the prospect an exact resemblance of a mountainous country.
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He also erected what was called a pensile paradise, because his wife was desirous to have things like her own country, she having been bred up in the palaces of Media. "
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The nest of the South African Cape Weaver above provides an example of a 'pensile' nest, one supported entirely by suspension from above or from the side; the Cape Weaver likes to hang its nest from power lines and fences that crisscross the grasslands of the Western Cape.
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The translucent Thames reflected the pensile branches of the trees, while on its clear bosom boats and pleasure-barges were gliding; and as the sun disappeared in the western sky, it was richly coloured with a crimson hue in a cloudless horizon.
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Ellena heard once more, with the joy of liberty, the midnight breeze passing among the pensile branches of the palms, that loftily overshadowed a rude platform before the gate, and rustling with fainter sound among the pendent shrubs of the surrounding cliffs.
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The walls are beautifully stuccoed and decorated with Morisco fancifulness; the lofty ceiling was originally of the same favorite material, with the usual frostwork and pensile ornaments or stalactites; which, with the embellishments of vivid coloring and gilding, must have been gorgeous in the extreme.
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I saw the lantern pensile formerly taken out of the temple of
Five books of the lives, heroic deeds and sayings of Gargantua and his son Pantagruel
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Maritima are longer than those of the Pinus Lariccio, and the branches more pensile.
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It is, however, a graceful and beautiful object, enjoying to an eminent decree the lightness and airiness of the birch family, and spreading out its glistening leaves on the ends of a very slender and often pensile spray with an indescribable softness.
qms commented on the word pensile
If long warbling obliges a bird to rest
A cradle that rocks will suit him best.
His hot and intense style
Is cooled by the pensile
And soothed in a filipendulous nest.
January 12, 2015