ivory Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun a hard smooth ivory colored dentine that makes up most of the tusks of elephants and walruses
    tusk.
  2. noun a shade of white the color of bleached bones
    pearl; off-white; bone.

WordNet

I"vo*ry noun
Etymology
OE. ivori, F. ivoire, fr. L. eboreus made of ivory, fr. ebur, eboris, ivory, cf. Skr. ibha elephant. Cf. Eburnean.
Wordforms
plural Ivories
Definitions
  1. The hard, white, opaque, fine-grained substance constituting the tusks of the elephant. It is a variety of dentine, characterized by the minuteness and close arrangement of the tubes, as also by their double flexure. It is used in manufacturing articles of ornament or utility. ✍ Ivory is the name commercially given not only to the substance constituting the tusks of the elephant, but also to that of the tusks of the hippopotamus and walrus, the hornlike tusk of the narwhal, etc.
  2. The tusks themselves of the elephant, etc.
  3. Any carving executed in ivory. Mollett.
  4. pl. Teeth; as, to show one's ivories. Slang

Webster 1913