ceruse

[ seer-oos, si-roos ]

/ ˈsɪər us, sɪˈrus /

a pigment composed of white lead.

Origin of ceruse

1350–1400; Middle English < Latin cērussa

But art has taught her to supply furrowed deformities with ceruse boxes, and to repair a decayed complexion with an Italian fucus.

A Select Collection of Old English Plays |Robert Dodsley
Minium sometimes leans to orange; and there is made from ceruse a peculiar red, Mineral Orange.

Field's Chromatography |George Field
You will temper minium and ceruse and carmine with clear of egg.

Illumination and its Development in the Present Day |Sidney Farnsworth
A pot of ceruse, my child, that I took out of a lady's under-pocket.

The Beaux-Stratagem |George Farquhar

Afterward the pulveriz'd Ceruse is to be infus'd, and the Ointment stirr'd about till it be almost cold.

The Compleat Surgeon, or the Whole Art of Surgery Explain'd in a Most Familiar Method |Charles Gabriel Le Clerc

ceruse

/ (səˈruːs) /

another name for white lead (def. 1)

C14: from Old French céruse, from Latin cērussa, perhaps ultimately from Greek kēros wax