Flour sb.

Forms: 3 flure, 5–6 floure, 5–7 flowre, 5–8 flower, 4– flour. [A specific use of FLOWER; cf. F. fleur de farine the ‘flower’ or finest part of the meal.

  Johnson 1755 does not separate the words, nor does he recognize the spelling flour. But Cruden’s Concordance, 1738, recognizes the modern distinction.]

  1.  Originally, the ‘flower’ or finest quality of meal; hence, the finer portion of meal (whether from wheat or other grain) which is separated by bolting. Also, in modern use, the ordinary name for the meal or farina of wheat as opposed to that obtained from other grain.

c. 1250.  Gen. & Ex., 1013.

1340.  Ayenb., 210. Zuych difference ase þer is be-tuene þe cheue and þe corn, be-tuene bren and flour of huete.

c. 1400.  Lanfranc’s Cirurg., 46. Take mel roset … smal flour of barly & medle hem togidere.

c. 1420.  Liber Cure Cocorum (1862), 14. And floure of ryce þou grynd also.

c. 1440.  Promp. Parv., 168/1. Flowre of mele, farina, simila.

1533.  Elyot, Cast. Helthe, II. xi. (1541), 28 b. Breade of fyne flowre of wheate, hauynge no leuyn, is slowe of digestion.

1691.  Tryon, Wisd. Dictates, 21. Milk, Water, and Flower, seasoned with Salt, Flomery and Bonny-clabbor are rare Foods for them [Children].

1769.  Mrs. Raffald, Eng. Housekpr. (1778), 259. Rub a little of the butter into the flour, mix it stiff with a little cold water, then roll your paste straight out.

1809.  Pinkney, Travels through the South of France, 8. The biscuit in a long voyage becomes uneatable, and flower will not keep.

1846.  in Baxter, Libr. Pract. Agric. (ed. 4), II. 3. When perfectly ripe and ground into flour, it [Indian corn] is said to make bread of a quality not very acceptable to most persons.

1871.  Yeats, Techn. Hist. Comm., 36. The art of obtaining flour from corn, and making it into bread, was known to the Egyptians.

  b.  as type of whiteness.

1375.  Barbour, Bruce, VIII. 232.

a. 1440.  Sir Eglam., 949.

  † c.  In figurative phrase: To bolt all the flour: to investigate a matter thoroughly. Obs.

1590.  Spenser, F. Q., II. iv. 24.

  2.  By extension, a. The fine soft powder obtained by grinding or triturating seeds, farinaceous roots, or other alimentary substances. b. Any finely powdered dry substance.

  a.  1660.  F. Brooke, trans. Le Blanc’s Trav., 399. They make flower also of fish dryed in the Sun.

1836.  Macgillivray, trans. Humboldt’s Trav., xxv. 378. The valuable plant Jatropha, of which the root, as is well known, affords the flour of manioc, usually converted into bread, and furnishes what the Spanish colonists call pan de tierra cliente.

1855.  Ogilvie, Suppl., Flour-of-mustard. The seeds of mustard, dried, powdered, and sifted.

1879.  Encycl. Brit., IX. 348/2. Gumming or waxing them [artificial flowers] over, or dusting them with fine powdered glass or potato flour to represent the bloom.

1889.  Cent. Dict., s.v. Flour, Flour of meat, a fine flour made of dried meat.

c. 1400.  Lanfranc’s Cirurg., 99. Flour of bras brent.

1670.  W. Clarke, Nat. Hist. Nitre 88. If it [gunpowder] should be in flour, or fine powder.

1880.  W. H. Wardell, in Encycl. Brit. (ed. 9) XI. 323. The crystallized saltpetre, having almost the appearance of snow, and technically called ‘flour,’ is raked into the ‘washing-cistern.’

1894.  The Nation (N.Y.), 22 March, LVIII. 209/3. The sulphur found in other parts of Italy, especaily Romagna, is refined on the spot (as is some portion at Catania) and sold in ‘flour,’ in ‘rolls,’ or in ‘cakes,’ or simply ground.

  3.  attrib. and Comb., as flour-barrel, -dredge, -dredger, -grinder, -mill, -milling, -packer, -paste, -sack; flour-like adj.

1809.  W. Irving, Knickerb. (1850), VI. iii. 194. The continnual clatter bore no small resemblance to the music of a cooper hooping a *flour-barrel.

1858.  Simmonds, Dict. Trade, *Flour-dredge, a tin for sprinkling flour.

1828.  G. P. R. James, Richelieu, xxxvii. A man, holding a light, and habited in one of those dusty jackets, which have been the insignia of *flour-grinders from all generations.

1863.  A. B. Grosart, Small Sins (ed. 2), 84. You stoop to touch one of these exquisite blossoms In touching, ‘ay, with Helen’s finger,’ you inevitably brush off its powdery *flour-like dust.

1809.  E. A. Kendall, Trav., II. lii. 213–4. There are two other rivers in Wareham, upon which are fulling, *flower and saw mills, forges and carding-machines.

1825.  J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 142. We have given a section of a double *flour-mill.

1888.  Bryce, Amer. Commw., III. VI. cxiv. 643. Now, though St. Paul contains some 160,000 inhabitants, Minneapolis with 200,000 has distanced her in the race, and has become, having in the process destroyed the beauty of her Falls, the greatest *flour-milling centre in America.

1806.  Sporting Mag., XXVIII. Aug., 212/2. Close the pot hermetically, luting the interstices of the lid with *flour-paste.

1858.  Simmonds, Dict. Trade, *Flour-sack, a coarse bag for flour, holding usually 280 lbs.

  4.  Special comb., as flour-ball, a ball of flour; also a kind of potato that resembles a ball of flour when boiled; flour-beetle, a beetle that feeds on and is very destructive to flour (see quot.); flour-bolt, -bolter, a flour-sieve; flour-box, a tin box for dredging flour; flour-bread, wheaten bread; flour-cake dial. (see quot.); flour-dresser (see quot.); flour-emery, emery reduced to a fine powder; flour-factor (see quot. 1858); flour-gold (see quot.); flour-meat dial., food made with flour; flour-mite, one of several mites or acarids that are found in flour; flour-moth, a moth that feeds on flour, esp. Pyralis farinalis.

1877.  W. Jones, Finger-ring Lore, 438. A wealthy German farmer, living near Nordanhamn, was making *flour-balls in 1871 for his cattle.

1877.  N. W. Linc. Gloss., Flour-balls, a kind of potato.

1888.  Powles, trans. Kick’s Flour Manuf., ix. 248. The *flour beetle (Tenebrio molitor) belongs to the family of Melanosomata, [and] is of a pitch black or brown colour.

1874.  Knight, Dict. Mech., I. 889/2. *Flour-bolt. (Milling.) A gauze-covered revolving, cylindrical frame or reel, into which meal or chop from the stones is fed, in order to have the flour sifted through and separated from the offal.

1888.  Powles, trans. Kick’s Flour Manuf., vi. 177. The *flour bolter in the old mills was directly connected with the hurst. It was made of an open woven woollen cloth called bolting cloth.

1711.  Bailey, Dredger, A *Flower Box.

17[?].  Rose o’ Malindie O’, iv., in Child, Ballads, I. No. 20 (1882), 224/1.

1840.  R. Bremner, Excurs. Denmark, &c., II. 233. No part of it [the fare] surprised us more than the many different kinds of flour-bread, and cake.

1884.  Chesh. Gloss., *Flour cake. It is made from a small piece of ordinary bread dough rolled to the size of a plate, and about an inch thick, and then baked on both sides.

1858.  Simmonds, Dict. Trade, *Flour-dresser, a cylinder for dressing flour, instead of passing it through bolting cloths.

1888.  Powles, trans. Kick’s Flour Manuf., vi. 176. The sieve is stretched on an inclined cylinder furnished with brushes on a spindle revolving inside…. This variety is called the ‘flour dresser,’ or wire and brush machine.

1884.  F. J. Britten, The Watch and Clockmakers’ Handbook, 101. *Flour emery, a finer kind also used for smooth burnishers.

1815.  Gen. Hist., in Ann. Reg., 53/2. They were chiefly mealmen and *flour factors.

1858.  Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Flour-dealer, an agent for millers; one who sells flour to bakers.

1869.  R. B. Smyth, Gold Fields of Victoria, 611. *Flour-gold—The finest alluvial drift-gold.

1707.  Floyer, Physic. Pulse-Watch, 83. Water-drinking, Milk, Meats, Flower-meats, and cool Herbs, stop the Pulse.

1876.  Whitby Gloss., Flour-meat, bread food; pastry.

1893.  Times, 15 May, 7/1. The ravages of the *flour moth, and the damage it was doing in English mills.