can·vas
(k
n
v
s)
KEY
NOUN:
- A heavy, coarse, closely woven fabric of cotton, hemp, or flax, used for tents and sails.
-
- A piece of such fabric on which a painting, especially an oil painting, is executed.
- A painting executed on such fabric.
- A fabric of coarse open weave, used as a foundation for needlework.
- The background against which events unfold, as in a historical narrative:
a grim portrait of despair against the bright canvas of the postwar economy.
-
Nautical
A sail or set of sails.
-
- A tent or group of tents.
- A circus tent.
-
Sports
The floor of a ring in which boxing or wrestling takes place.
IDIOM:
under canvas
-
Nautical
With sails spread.
- In a tent or tents.
ETYMOLOGY:
Middle English
canevas, from Old French, and from Medieval Latin
canav
sium both ultimately from Latin
cannabis,
hemp ; see
cannabis
