frontispiece

From Middle French frontispice, from Latin frontispicium, from frōns (“forehead”) + specere (“look at”). Spelling altered due to folk etymology, influenced by piece.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈfɹʌn.tɪsˌpiːs/, /ˈfɹɒn.tɪsˌpiːs/[1][2]
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈfɹʌn.tɪsˌpis/, /ˈfɹɑn.tɪsˌpis/[3]

frontispiece (plural frontispieces)

1. (publishing) An illustration that is on the page before the title page of a book, a section of one, or a magazine.
   • 1939 September, D. S. Barrie, “The Railways of South Wales”, in Railway Magazine, page 163:

     The viaduct was illustrated as a frontispiece to THE RAILWAY MAGAZINE of September, 1938. [In this case, the frontispiece is between the title page and the first article.]

2. (archaic, publishing) The title page of a book.
3. (architecture) A façade, especially an ornamental one.
4. (architecture) A small ornamental pediment, especially at the top of a window or door.
5. (slang, archaic, humorous) A person's face.
   • 1844, George Pope Morris, Nathaniel Parker Willis, The New Mirror, volume 3, page 99:

     He carries on his frontispiece the indubitable marks of a money-dealer. His is one of those peculiar faces […]

frontispiece (third-person singular simple present frontispieces, present participle frontispiecing, simple past and past participle frontispieced)

1. (transitive, rare) To supply with a frontispiece.

   The novel was frontispieced with a portrait of the author.

• Michael Quinion (2004) “Frontispiece”, in Ballyhoo, Buckaroo, and Spuds: Ingenious Tales of Words and Their Origins, Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Books in association with Penguin Books, →ISBN.