quartz

From German Quarz, from Middle High German (Central East German) quarz, twarc, from a West Slavic language [compare Polish twardy (“hard”), Czech tvrdý (“hard”)], from Proto-Slavic *tvьrdъ ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *twerH- (“to enclose, grab”).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /k(w)ɔːts/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /k(w)ɔɹts/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔːts, -ɔɹts
• Homophone: courts (some accents)
• Homophone: quarts

quartz (countable and uncountable, plural quartzes)

1. (mineralogy) The most abundant mineral on the earth's surface, of chemical composition silicon dioxide, SiO₂. It occurs in a variety of forms, both crystalline and amorphous. Found in every environment.
   • 1883, George Downing Liveing, James Dewar, “On the Ultra-Violet Spectra of the Elements”, in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, volume 174, Barrison and Sons, part I, page 188:

     The telescope and collimator have each an object-glass consisting of a single lens of quartz 1½ inch diameter and a focal length of 18½ inches for the sodium yellow light, but not more than 16 inches for the highest rays measured.

   • 1892 April, Armiger Barczinsky, “The Golden Snail”, in Sylvanus Urban (pseudonym of Edward Cave), editor, The Gentleman's Magazine, volume 272, page 331:

     Subsequently, the old Malay brought him the present specimen in a state of torpidity, telling him he had found it in a cavity of the quartz reef.

   • 1948, Theodore Roethke, “The Shape of the Fire”, in The Lost Son and Other Poems, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday & Company, →OCLC; republished in The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke, London: Faber and Faber […], 1968, →OCLC, page 62:

     My meat eats me. Who waits at the gate? / Mother of quartz, your words writhe into my ear. / Renew the light, lewd whisper.

2. (uncountable, slang) Crystal meth: methamphetamine hydrochloride.

• Thesaurus:quartz

• Colorado topaz

• → Malay: kuarza

Borrowed from German Quarz, from a West Slavic language, from Proto-Slavic *tvьrdъ (“hard”).

• IPA^(key): /kwaʁts/

• Audio:

  (file)

quartz m (plural quartz)

1. quartz

   Synonym: cristal de roche

• → Catalan: quars

• “quartz”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.