grotesque

Definitions


[ɡrə(ʊ)ˈtɛsk], (Adjective)

Definitions:
- comically or repulsively ugly or distorted
(e.g: a figure wearing a grotesque mask)


Phrases:

Origin:
mid 16th century (as noun): from French crotesque (the earliest form in English), from Italian grottesca, from opera or pittura grottesca ‘work or painting resembling that found in a grotto’; ‘grotto’ here probably denoted the rooms of ancient buildings in Rome which had been revealed by excavations, and which contained murals in the grotesque style


[ɡrə(ʊ)ˈtɛsk], (Noun)

Definitions:
- a very ugly or comically distorted figure or image
(e.g: the rods are carved in the form of a series of gargoyle faces and grotesques)

- a family of 19th-century sans serif typefaces


Phrases:

Origin:
mid 16th century (as noun): from French crotesque (the earliest form in English), from Italian grottesca, from opera or pittura grottesca ‘work or painting resembling that found in a grotto’; ‘grotto’ here probably denoted the rooms of ancient buildings in Rome which had been revealed by excavations, and which contained murals in the grotesque style




definition by Oxford Dictionaries