TARTAR • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Tartar

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/tˈɑrtər/ Listen

noun

Tartar n.

(Chem.) A reddish crust or sediment in wine casks, consisting essentially of crude cream of tartar, and used in marking pure cream of tartar, tartaric acid, potassium carbonate, black flux, etc., and, in dyeing, as a mordant for woolen goods; called also argol, wine stone, etc.

A correction which often incrusts the teeth, consisting of salivary mucus, animal matter, and phosphate of lime.

Cream of tartar. (Chem.) See under Cream.

Tartar emetic (Med. Chem.), a double tartrate of potassium and basic antimony. It is a poisonous white crystalline substance having a sweetish metallic taste, and used in medicine as a sudorific and emetic.

Tartar n.

A native or inhabitant of Tartary in Asia; a member of any one of numerous tribes, chiefly Moslem, of Turkish origin, inhabiting the Russian Europe; written also, more correctly but less usually, Tatar.

A person of a keen, irritable temper.

To catch a tartar, to lay hold of, or encounter, a person who proves too strong for the assailant. (Colloq.)

Tartar n. See Tartarus.

adjective

Tartar adj. Of or pertaining to Tartary in Asia, or the Tartars.

See images of 'Tartar'

Etymology of 'Tartar'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Tartar" Quotes from Famous Books

... Westminster-hall; but as you have flown about the world, and are returned to your ark without finding a place to rest your foot, I should think you might as well inquire about the house I notify to you, as set out with your caravan to Greatworth, like a Tartar chief; especially as the laws of this country will not permit you to stop in the first meadow you like, and turn your horses to grazing without saying by ...

— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole

... Why father and mother are as fond of thee as can be; they'll lower thy rent if that's what it is—and thou knowst they never grudge thee bit or drop. And Margaret Hall, of all folk, to lodge wi'! She's such a Tartar! Sooner than not have a quarrel, she'd fight right hand against left. Thou'lt have no peace of thy life. What on earth can make you think of such ...

— The Grey Woman and other Tales • Mrs. (Elizabeth) Gaskell

... a mixture of baking soda and dry acid (cream of tartar or phosphates in the better baking powders, alum in the cheap ones). These dry acids cannot act on the soda until they go into solution. As long as the baking powder remains dry in the can, there is ...

— Common Science • Carleton W. Washburne

... article to take the tartar off the teeth—and it does take it off, too, and generly the enamel along with it—but I stayed about one night longer than I ought to, and was just in the act of sliding out when I ran across you on the trail this side of town, and you told me they were coming, and begged me to ...

— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... by glowering like that, and looking as though he could devour somebody? How different he used to be in dear old Brooklyn! Who could have thought he would turn out such a Tartar? Well, there is no knowing any man; and yet—— It is a pity not to give him something to glower about," thinks Miss Massereene, in an access of rage, and forthwith deliberately sets herself out to ...

— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton

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