See Also: Mosaic(medicine)
Mosaic Law(dictionary)
mosaic(encyclopedia)
mosaic(2)(dictionary)
mosaic(1)(dictionary)
Mosaic(dictionary)
MOSAIC(finance)
MOSAIC Oil NL(finance)
mosaic(dictionary)
mosaic egg(medicine)

Babylon (oh) and mosaic(1) (iou)


Babylon (oh)



an ancient Middle Eastern city that was the capital of Babylonia and was famous for its great wealth. People sometimes use the name Babylon to mean a place of pleasure and immoral behaviour.

mosaic(1) (iou)



mosaic noun & adjective1. LME.

A. noun.
The process of producing pictures or decorative patterns by cementing together small pieces of stone, glass, or Other (usu. hard) material of various colours; pictures or patterns, or a constructive or decorative material, produced in this way. LME.
K. Clark The floors were of mosaic with figures, like a Roman pavement. S. Kitzinger We shall be able, as if piecing together fragments of mosaic, to learn more and more.
b. A piece of mosaic; a design in mosaic. L17.
J. J. Hennessy The expenditure of 60,000 on a mosaic outside the council offices.
transf. & fig. Something resembling mosaic or a mosaic in its diversity of composition; spec. a mosaic map or photograph. M17.
W. Hogarth The pine-apple, which Nature has..distinguished by bestowing..rich mosaic upon it. Listener Janacek..building his structures from a mosaic of ideas. M. Gee Living like animals, the floor..a mosaic of bottles and coke-cans and girly magazines.
Biology. An individual (commonly an animal) composed of cells of two genetically different types. E20.
An array of small photo-emissive metal plates forming the target plate in a Television camera tube; an array of piezoelectric transducers in an ultrasonic detector. E20.
Mosaic disease of plants. M20.
rugose mosaic: see RUGOSE 1.
b. adjective.
Pertaining to mosaic as a form of Art; produced in mosaic: L16.
P. Cutting The bathhouse with its..bright mosaic floors.
b. transf. & fig. Diverse in composition or appearance; resembling the colours or patterns of mosaic. M17.
Railway Magazine The large diagrammatic mosaic control panel gives details of all the power supplies.
Embryology. Of, pertaining to, or characterized by a mode of development in which regions in an embryo are predetermined by the corresponding regions in that embryo at an earlier stage of development. L19.
Designating a viral plant disease characterized by a mottled pattern of discoloration on the leaves. L19.
Biology. Having or composed of cells of two genetically different types. E20.
Of a composite photograph or map: made up of a number of separate photographs of overlapping areas. E20.
Crystallography. Of (the structure of) a crystal: made up of small blocks of perfect lattices set at very slight angles to one another. M20.
Special collocations: mosaic gold (a) tin disulphide (stannic sulphide), used as an imitation gold pigment; (b) an alloy of copper and zinc used in cheap jewellery and ornamental metalwork. mosaic work = sense A.1 above.
mosaically adverb E17.