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prettygoodword ([personal profile] prettygoodword) wrote2013-05-07 07:19 am

rupestral

rupestral (RU-pis-tral) - adj., composed of, inscribed on, or growing on rock.


Alternate forms include rupecolous and rupestrine, the latter seeming to specialize in the growing-on sense. The canonical sample usage, used in every online dictionary with an example, is "rupestral drawings in the caves of Northern Spain" (I almost didn't run this as so many dictionaries seem to use a single source for the entry, but I eventually found evidence of it being used in botany.) I don't have a date for its use in English, but the common root to these forms is Latin rūpēs, steep cliff/crag.

---L.

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