[f. prec.; Fr. has festonner.]
† 1. intr. To hang in festoons. Obs.
1789. Mrs. Piozzi, Journ. France, I. 236. The road from Padua hither is not a good one; but so adorned, one cares not much whether it is good or no; so sweetly are the mulberry trees planted on each side, with vines richly festooning up and down them, as if for the decoration of a dance at the opera.
2. trans. To adorn with or as with festoons.
1800. Moore, Anacreon, xlvi. 18. Clusters ripe festoon the vine.
1841. Emerson, Nat., Meth. Nat., Wks. (Bohn), II. 224. Vegetable life, which … festoons the globe with a garland of grasses and vines.
1870. Disraeli, Lothair, lxvi. 349. The arcades were festooned.
3. To form into festoons; to hang up in or like festoons. Also with up.
1801. Gabrielli, Myst. Husb., I. 267. The curtains … were festooned up with gold and silver cord.
1811. W. Taylor, in Robberds, Mem., II. 350. We should gladly have festooned for you the last garlands of our hospitality.
1859. Jephson, Brittany, ii. 19. I could see that the bedclothes and curtains, which were tastefully festooned in graceful folds, were of snowy whiteness.
1872. C. King, Mountain. Sierra Nev., xiv. 286. The party for right organized those august mobs, the Vigilance Committees, and quickly began to festoon their more depraved fellow-men from tree to tree.
4. To connect by festoons.
1832. Tennyson, Dream Fair Women, 70.
| Growths of jasmine turn’d | |
| Their humid arms festooning tree to tree. |
Hence Festooned ppl. a.; Festooning vbl. sb. and ppl. a.
1811. Pinkerton, Petral., II. 84. They assume, by imperceptible degrees, the beautiful green colour; which, added to their undulating and festooned form, and their disposition in little masses near each other, makes them resemble in a singular manner the beautiful foliage of trees, and, in other parts, the waves of the sea gently agitated.
1860. Tyndall, Glac., I. xxvii. 205. A festooned curtain formed entirely of minute ice crystals.
1884. Syd. Soc. Lex., Festooned-rings, the tendinous rings of the auriculo-ventricular and arterial openings in the heart.
