palls

Noun

pall (plural palls)

1. (archaic, poetic) Fine cloth, especially purple cloth used for robes.
2. A heavy cloth laid over a coffin or tomb; a shroud laid over a corpse.
   • After his death he [Diocletian] remained corporeally in possession of the palace, his tomb resting in the centre of the mausoleum. Thirty years or so later, a woman was put to death for stealing the purple pall from his sarcophagus, a strange, crazy crime, […]1941, Rebecca West [pseudonym; Cicily Isabel Fairfield], “Dalmatia”, in Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: The Record of a Journey through Yugoslavia in 1937, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., published...
3. A piece of cardboard, covered with linen and embroidered on one side, used to cover the chalice during the Eucharist.
4. (obsolete) A cloth used for various purposes on the altar in a church, such as a corporal (“cloth on which elements of the Eucharist are placed”) or frontal (“drapery covering the front of an altar”).
5. (archaic) An outer garment; a cloak, mantle, or robe.
   • In a long purple pall, whose ſkirt with gold, / Was fretted all about, ſhe was arayd, […]1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto IX”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 37, page 317
6. (figuratively) Something that covers or surrounds like a cloak; in particular, a cloud of dust, smoke, etc., or a feeling of fear, gloom, or suspicion.
   • The early election results cast a pall over what was supposed to be a celebration.

See all 13 meanings of pall