squame

Borrowed from Old French esquame, from Latin squāma. Doublet of squama.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /skweɪm/

squame (plural squames)

1. (obsolete) A scale (of metal, or on the eyes etc.).
   • Chaucer

     iron squames

2. (zoology) The scale, or exopodite, of an antenna of a crustacean.
3. (medicine) A flake of dead skin tissue.
   • 2011, Terence Allen and Graham Cowling, The Cell: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford 2011, p. 80:

     Squames begin life as normal cells in the lower layers of the epidermis but, as they travel towards the surface, they progressively lose all recognizable contents, becoming plates of mainly keratin protein, based on a progressive deposition of protein on the intermediate filaments of the cytoskeleton.

• masque

Learned alteration of Old French eschame, after its source, Latin squama.

• IPA^(key): /skwam/

squame f (plural squames)

1. (archaic or literary) scale

• “squame” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

squame f

1. plural of squama