arch. [a. OF. acate, achate, ad. L. achātes, a. Gr. ἀχάτης. The unchanged L. achates was also in common use. In end of 6 the form AGATE, agath was adopted from the Fr., and is now the ordinary form.] An agate, a kind of precious stone. (It was occasionally confounded from similarity of name with the gagates or jet.)
c. 1230. Arcren Riwle, 134. Enne deorewurðe ȝimston þet hette achate.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R. (1495), XVI. x. 557. Achates is a precyous stone, and is blacke wyth white veynes.
1430. Lydg., Chron. Troy, I. vi. Which stone these prudent clerkes call Achates most vertuous of all.
1535. Coverdale, Ex. xxviii. 19. A Ligurios, an Achatt and an Ametyst [1590 Genevan achate, 1611, agate].
1648. Sir E. Bacon, in Bury Wills (1850), 216. I give him alsoe my achate with the picture of the butterfly in it.
1750. Leonardus’ Mirror of Stones, 64. Sicily gave the first Achates, which was found in the River Acheus.
1855. P. J. Bailey, Mystic, 90. The achate, wealth adductive, and the mind of the immortals gladdening.
