frieze

Etymology 1

Late Middle English, from French and Middle French frise, probably from Medieval Latin Frisia (“Frisian (wool)”) due to import via Northern ships. Or, from French friser (“to curl”)..

noun

1. A kind of coarse woolen cloth or stuff with a shaggy or tufted (friezed) nap on one side.
   This dark, frieze-coated, hoarse, teeth-chattering month […] 1796, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, On Observing a Blossom on the First of February 1796
   From beggar's frieze to monarch's robe, One common doom is pass'd; Sweet nature's works, the swelling globe, Must all burn out at last. 1829, Charles Sprague, To My Cigar
   "You may shoot, or you may not," cried Scarrow, striking his hand upon the breast of his frieze jacket. 1897, Arthur Conan Doyle, How the Governor of Saint Kitt's came Home

verb

1. (transitive) To make a nap on (cloth); to friz.

Etymology 2

From French and Middle French frise f, derived from an Upper Italian fris f, Medieval Latin frisum, frisium, frigium, frixum, frigium, of controversial origin, possibly from multiple sources, Arabic إِفْرِيز (ʔifrīz, “king beam, cornice”) and Latin opus Phrygium (“a kind of embroidery”, literally “work of Phrygia”), the demonym Frisian and terms related to the textile term above in a transferred sense.

noun

1. (architecture) That part of the entablature of an order which is between the architrave and cornice. It is a flat member or face, either uniform or broken by triglyphs, and often enriched with figures and other ornaments of sculpture.
2. Any sculptured or richly ornamented band in a building or, by extension, in rich pieces of furniture.
3. A banner with a series of pictures.
   The classroom had an alphabet frieze that showed an animal for each letter.

verb

1. (transitive, architecture) To put a frieze on.