flint1
/flɪnt
/noun [mass noun]
1A hard grey rock consisting of nearly pure silica (chert), occurring chiefly as nodules in chalk: houses built of brick and flint [as modifier]: flint implements...
- Silica precipitated from aqueous solution at low temperatures gives cryptocrystalline varieties such as opal, jasper, chalcedony, agate, carnelian, onyx, flint, and chert.
- It passes upwards into almost flat-lying white coccolith chalk with parallel lines of black flint nodules.
- The artifacts recovered from these excavations will give a clearer picture of the technology and particularly their production and use of flint and chert.
1.1 [count noun] A piece of flint, especially as flaked or ground in ancient times to form a tool or weapon: the early settlers also found a ready supply of flints in the chalk cliffs...
- It was associated with a cobbled ‘work area’ covered by vast quantities of pottery, five stone axes, a number of broken tools and flints.
- The site is dated by large quantities of Mesolithic flints, such as crescent-shaped microliths, scrapers and points.
- Excavations at the site produced over 300 worked flints of early-middle Mesolithic type.
1.2 [count noun] A piece of flint used with steel to produce an igniting spark, e.g. in a flintlock gun, or (in modern use) a piece of an alloy used similarly, especially in a cigarette lighter: he struck a light with his flint...
- For example, an alloy of calcium and cerium is used in flints in cigarette and other types of lighters.
- Misch metal is used to make the flint in cigarette lighters.
- Lauren sparked her flints together against the wood.
Origin
Old English; related to Middle Dutch vlint and Old High German flins.
Rhymes
Flint2
/flint
/An industrial city in southeastern Michigan, an auto industry center since the Buick Company was established there in 1903; population 112,900 (est. 2008).