wainscot

From Middle English waynscot, from Middle Low German wagenschot, assumed to be from wagen (“wagon”) + schot, believed to mean “partition”.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈweɪnskɒt/
• (obsolete) IPA^(key): /ˈwɛnskət/, /ˈweɪnskət/[1]

wainscot (plural wainscots)

Wainscot

1. (architecture) An area of wooden (especially oaken) panelling on the lower part of a room’s walls.
   • 1598, William Shakespeare, As You Like It, act 3, scene 3:

     […] this fellow will but join you together as they join wainscot; then one of you will prove a shrunk panel, and like green timber, warp, warp.

   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 3, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 11:

     Entering that gable-ended Spouter-Inn, you found yourself in a wide, low, straggling entry with old-fashioned wainscots, reminding one of the bulwarks of some condemned old craft.

2. Any of various noctuid moths.

• panelling (uncountable)

wainscot (third-person singular simple present wainscots, present participle wainscotting, simple past and past participle wainscotted)

1. To decorate a wall with a wainscot.