cusping

[ kuhs-ping ]

noun

1. Architecture. decoration in the form of a cusp, a pair of curves that are tangent to a real or imaginary line defining an area being decorated and that meet at a point within that area:

   Three-leaved motifs are cut into the jamb outside each inner and outer point of the cusping.

Word History and Origins

Origin of cusping¹

First recorded in 1795–1805

Example Sentences

That moment in life when your life is a blank slate to be written upon and you're just cusping into the world, like my son was in this book.

From Salon

Once business woke up to the Internet’s value, an event that fortunately took a while, the dynamics began to change, cusping in the Dot-com bubble, yet continuing to grow at an amazing pace ever since.

From Forbes

When I made the final photogram, I floated all the layers of material in water – so you get a little distortion, some cusping round the seed-heads.

From The Guardian

The cusping throughout is bolder than in the E. E. period.

From Project Gutenberg

In the so-called fan-tracery roof, that was the culmination of this distinctive form of vaulting, the entire surface of the roof is covered with radiating ribs resembling the sections of an outspread fan, connected by bands of trefoil or quatrefoil ornament known as cusping, and, in some cases—notably in that of Henry VII's chapel at Westminster—with pendant stalactite ornaments drooping from the point of intersection of the groins.

From Project Gutenberg