Definition of "finery"

finery

/ˈfaɪnəɹi/

noun
countable and uncountable, plural fineries
1. (obsolete) Fineness; beauty.
2. (countable) Ornament; decoration; especially, excessive decoration; showy clothes; jewels.
  Quotations
  The city also shone through the luxury of the higher castes: in the fineries of their dress, the rich manner of their living, their many servants, silver table services, and showy furnishings.
  1980, John A. Crow, The Epic of Latin America
3. fine point; minute characteristic
  Quotations
  the translator should master the language he translates from as thoroughly as his mother tongue, knowing all its fineries
  2020, Lieven D’hulst, Kaisa Koskinen, Translating in Town
4. (ironworking) A charcoal hearth or furnace for the conversion of cast iron into wrought iron, or into iron suitable for puddling.
  Quotations
  In front of the finery hearth in which the sow is melted down again, the finer is working with a long iron bar called a ringer (from French 'ringard') with which he keeps the molten iron in motion by stirring, an essential stage in the process of refining.
  1957, H.R. Schubert, History of the British Iron and Steel Industry, page 160