Layer (root: layer)

• POS: Noun, Verb (usu participle)
• HYPHEN: lay=er

CIDE DICTIONARY

Layer, n. [See Lay to cause to lie flat.].

•  One who, or that which, lays.  [1913 Webster]
•  That which is laid; a stratum; a bed; one thickness, course, or fold laid over another; as, a layer of clay or of sand in the earth; a layer of bricks, or of plaster; the layers of an onion.  [1913 Webster]
•  A shoot or twig of a plant, not detached from the stock, laid under ground for growth or propagation.  [1913 Webster]
•  An artificial oyster bed.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

Layer, n. & v.
--n.
1 a thickness of matter, esp. one of several, covering a surface.
2 a person or thing that lays.
3 a hen that lays eggs.
4 a shoot fastened down to take root while attached to the parent plant.
--v.tr.
1 a arrange in layers. b cut (hair) in layers.
2 propagate (a plant) as a layer.

Idiom

layer-out a person who prepares a corpse for burial.

Derivative

layered adj.

Etymology

ME f. LAY(1) + -ER(1)

THESAURUS

Layer

Appleton layer, F layer, Heaviside-Kennelly layer, Van Allen belt, arrange in layers, belt, bookie, chemosphere, delaminate, desquamate, exfoliate, flake, ionosphere, isothermal region, laminate, lay down, lay up, lower atmosphere, outer atmosphere, photosphere, scale, stratify, stratosphere, stratum, substratosphere, tropopause, troposphere, upper atmosphere

ROGET THESAURUS

Layer

Layer

N layer, stratum, strata, course, bed, zone, substratum, substrata, floor, flag, stage, story, tier, slab, escarpment, table, tablet, dess, flagstone, board, plank, trencher, platter, plate, lamina, lamella, sheet, foil, wafer, scale, flake, peel, coat, pellicle, membrane, film, leaf, slice, shive, cut, rasher, shaving, integument, eschar, stratification, scaliness, nest of boxes, coats of an onion, monolayer, bilayer, trilayer, lamellar, lamellated, lamelliform, layered, laminated, laminiferous, micaceous, schistose, schistous, scaly, filmy, membranous, pellicular, flaky, squamous, foliated, foliaceous, stratified, stratiform, tabular, discoid, spathic, spathose, trilamellar, graphitic.