SCARAB • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Scarab

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noun

Scarabee, Scarab n.

(Zool.) Any one of numerous species of lamellicorn beetles of the genus Scarabaeus, or family Scarabaeidae, especially the sacred, or Egyptian, species (Scarabaeus sacer, and Scarabaeus Egyptiorum).

(Egyptian Archaeology, Jewelry) A stylized representation of a scarab beetle carved in stone or faience, or made in baked clay, usually in a conventionalized form in which the beetle has its legs held closely at its sides, and commonly having an inscription on the flat underside; a symbol of resurrection, used by the ancient Egyptians as an ornament or a talisman, and in modern times used in jewelry, usually by engraving the formalized scarab design on cabuchon stones. Also used attributively; as, a scarab bracelet (a bracelet containing scarabs); a ring with a scarab (the carved stone itelf).

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Etymology of 'Scarab'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Scarab" Quotes from Famous Books

... embalming, filled the room. Gradually the yellow skin preserved by the natron began to appear through the cross-hatchings of the bandages. Attached to a thick gold wire round the neck and placed over the heart was a scarab of green basalt, mounted in a gold setting; and on the henna-stained little finger of the left hand was another of steatite. As the right arm was freed from its artificially tightened grasp a peculiar wooden cylinder ...

— Masques & Phases • Robert Ross

... don't—not at present. There was a tomb opened at one of the camps, not long ago, which told a tragic story of the end of robbery and plunder. The roof had fallen in while the burglar was busy unwrapping the cloths from the dead mummy. He was evidently trying to get at the heart-scarab, I suppose, and at the jewels which the windings held in their place. He had been smothered, taken in the act. Probably he had left his fellow-plunderers at the entrance; the roof may have looked unsafe, but he had hoped to collect all ...

— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer

... the orchestra interested Twinkle more than anything else. They were seated upon the broad top of a big toadstool at one side, and the musicians were all beetles and big-bugs. A fat water-beetle played a bass fiddle as big and fat as himself, and two pretty ladybugs played the violins. A scarab, brightly colored with scarlet and black, tooted upon a long horn, and a sand-beetle made the sound of a drum with its wings. Then there was a coleopto, making shrill sounds like a flute—only of course Twinkle didn't know the ...

— Twinkle and Chubbins - Their Astonishing Adventures in Nature-Fairyland • L. Frank (Lyman Frank) Baum

... Central African adventure. I take it that this book is partly true, and partly an effort of the imagination. However this may be, it has given me an idea. It happens, how you will see in the accompanying manuscript (which together with the Scarab, the 'Royal Son of the Sun,' and the original sherd, I am sending to you by hand), that my ward, or rather my adopted son Leo Vincey and myself have recently passed through a real African adventure, of a nature so much more marvellous than the one which you ...

— She • H. Rider Haggard

... a change to come back from Elinor in scarab robes being carried along in a litter to Elinor sitting beside him in a bathing suit. But hardly ...

— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet