- To separate (a substance) into soluble and insoluble components through percolation; to leach.
1997, Thomas Pynchon, Mason & Dixon:
- the Slaves are out in the Storm, doing their Owners’ Laundry, observing and reading each occurrence of Blood, Semen, Excrement, Saliva, Urine, Sweat, Road-Mud, dead Skin, and other such Data of Biography, whose pure form they practice Daily, before all is lixiviated ’neath Heaven.
- Of or relating to lye or lixivium; of the quality of alkaline salts.
- Impregnated with salts from wood ashes.
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Boyle to this entry?)
Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.