bone lacen.adj.
/ˈbəʊn leɪs/, U.S. /ˈboʊn ˌleɪs/ Now chiefly historical.
A. n.
A type of fine lace originally made using fine threads wound on bone or ivory bobbins; a piece or variety of this. Cf. bone n.1 18.
ΘΚΠ
the world > textiles and clothing > textiles > textile fabric or an article of textile fabric > textile fabric > textile fabric manufactured in specific way > [noun] > consisting of loops or looped stitches > lace > pillow or bobbin
bonework1556
bone lace1564
bobbin-work1681
pillow lace1815
Madras lace1882
point1882
bobbin-lace-
1564 in E. Roberts & K. Parker Southampton Probate Inventories, 1447–1575 (1992) I. 217 xx yardes bone lace, xx d.
1574 E. Hellowes tr. A. de Guevara Familiar Epist. 512 To see hir..take hir cusshin for boane lace, or hir rock to spinne.
1600 in J. Arnold Queen Elizabeth's Wardrobe Unlock'd (1988) 276/2 Item one loose gowne of blacke prented satten cut and tuft laide with bonelace of venice golde and blacke silke faced with blacke taphata.
1666 London Gaz. No. 94/3 Our Manufactures..of Points and Bone-laces.
1709 R. Steele Tatler No. 61. ⁋4 [They] should be sent to knit, or sit down to Bobbins or Bone-lace.
1773 London Evening Post 5 Oct. (advt.) For exportation, East-India prohibited goods, cambricks, silk,..thread bone-lace, and muslins stitched with thread.
1808 C. Vancouver Gen. View Agric. Devon i. 4 Its chief manufactures are the different kinds of woollen cloths, as also of bone-lace.
1858 Jrnl. Statist. Soc. 21 429 Beeston..was once celebrated for the manufacture of Bone Lace, and Straw Hats.
1907 A. P. Moody Devon Pillow Lace i. 10 In England the existing patterns most like the early bone lace are the Bedfordshire.
1978 Virginia Mag. Hist. & Biogr. 86 147 Hall resumed a female identity and supported herself by making bone lace.
2011 N. Korda Labors Lost i. 27 Bonelace varied in quality and price depending on its complexity and the thread with which it was made.
B. adj.
Made of or trimmed with bone lace.
ΘΚΠ
the world > textiles and clothing > textiles > textile fabric or an article of textile fabric > ornamental textiles > ornamental trimmings > [adjective] > lace > specific
bone lace1622
gold-laced1624
point-laced1665
bone-laced1762
1622 L. Digges tr. G. de Céspedes y Meneses Gerardo i. iii. 195 His Doublet & Breeches, cloth of Siluer were cut vpon Orenge-color'd Taffeta, with a strong Ierkin..and a Bone-lace edging, Flemish.
a1640 A. Van der Doort Catal. King Charles Coll. Pictures (1757) sig. N A certain lady's picture in her hair, in a gold bonelace little ruff, and black habit, lined with white furr.
1692 C. Gildon Post-boy rob'd of his Mail I. i. xxxiii. 119 Condemning the Country Virgin in her Bone-lace Coif.
1777 P. Thicknesse Year's Journey France & Spain II. xlviii. 117 The women wear a broad bone lace ruff about their necks, and a narrow edging of the same sort round their caps.
1883 Magnet 2 July 3/5 A body trimming of rose point from Innishmacsaint and some fine Youghal point, as well as bone-lace edging.
1973 Port Charlotte (Florida) Daily Herald News 23 Feb. 5/6 The groom's mother wore a long velvet gown of eggplant color with bone lace collar and cuffs.
2010 J. Carty Paper House 74 My mother died and you came to the funeral In a bone lace dress you had laid away For your wedding.
Compounds
General attributive and objective, as bone-lace maker, bone-lace trade, bone-lace weaver, etc.
ΚΠ
1597 in J. T. Murray Eng. Dramatic Companies (1910) II. 377 Roger Clarke, of Nottyngham, bondlace wever.
1610 in H. Stocks Rec. Borough Leicester (1923) IV. 101 To Daniell Wright Bonelacemaker xli.
1632 R. Boyle Diary 16 Apr. in Lismore Papers (1886) 1st Ser. III. 136 I gaue..to the bonelace woman xs, to apparell a poore begging girle owt of Mounster, & teache her to make bonelace.
1715 tr. C. de Renneville French Inquisition 160 A Bone-Lace Weaver of Roan, her Hair like the Golden Noble, her Skin as white as Milk.
1794 H. Wansey Jrnl. 11 May in Jrnl. Excursion to U.S. (1796) 48 There is also..a large bone-lace manufactory, employing near an hundred cushions.
1848 Express 31 Jan. 2/5 The overtasked artisan and the tambouring girl or bone-lace knitter.
1873 Notts. Guardian 26 Sept. 6/6 Before the invention of the frame, a considerable number of the females in Notts. were engaged in what I have heard spoken of as the bone lace trade.
1922 N.Y. Times 23 Aug. 1/4 (advt.) A bone lace and shoe lace factory in Vorarlberg..seeks..well-introduced representative.
2007 Your Family Tree July 35/4 In Elizabethan times..women and children were able to earn considerably more in bone lace making than their male counterparts could in agriculture.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2018; most recently modified version published online December 2021).
<
n.adj.1564