Word.ws English Dictionary

terra-cotta

terra-cotta is the alternative form of terracotta.

Meaning of terracotta

Noun

terracotta (usually uncountable, plural terracottas)

  1. (usually) A hard red-brown unglazed earthenware, used for pottery and building construction.
    • Among her busts in terra cotta are those of John Brown, Charles Sumner, Lincoln, and Longfellow.1918, Benjamin Brawley, “XI. Sculptors.—Meta Warrick Fuller”, in The Negro in Literature and Art in the United States, page 113
  2. (usually) A reddish brown colour, like that of terra cotta.

See all 3 meanings of terracotta

Forms of terra-cotta

pluralterra-cottas

Questions about terra-cotta

What is terra-cotta the alternative form of?
Terra-cotta is the alternative form of terracotta.

Words near terra-cotta in the dictionary

  1. terra nullius
  2. terra ponderosa
  3. terra preta
  4. terra rossa
  5. terra sigillata
  6. terra-cotta
  7. terra-cottas
  8. terra-japonica
  9. terra-mara
  10. Terraba
  11. terrabacterial

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: terra-cotta (page history and authors); terracotta (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “terra-cotta.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/terra-cotta. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.