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talc

UK/tælk/US/tælk/
nounB2+Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #12,557 of 15,258neutral

Talc is a fine powder dusted on skin to keep it dry. Dust with talc, a tin of talc, talcum powder.

It is the softest mineral there is, ranked one on the hardness scale, which is why it crushes to such a fine powder. Concerns about asbestos contamination in some sources have led to lawsuits and to a shift towards cornstarch powders.

Robert M. Lavinsky · CC BY-SA 3.0

Definitions of talc

  1. 1nountalcA fine powder dusted on skin to keep it dry.B2+

    “She dusted the baby with talc after his bath.”

talc is a mineral.

Where it comes from

Arabic talq names the mineral, through Persian and Middle French.

  1. Persian

    تلک

  2. Arabic

    طَلْق

  3. Middle French

    talc

  4. English, today

    talc

From Middle French talc, from Arabic طَلْق, from Persian تلک, from pal (“medicament”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Hair & Grooming

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talc in the wild

  • The two varieties are thus very similar to talc.

    Pyrophyllite

  • Pulmonary talcosis, or clown lung, is a pulmonary disorder caused by talc.

    Pulmonary talcosis

  • The top filler materials used are ground calcium carbonate (GCC), precipitated calcium carbonate (PCC), kaolin, talc, and carbon black.

    Filler (materials)

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.