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Definition of "high relief" []

  • Sculptural relief in which the modeled forms project from the background by at least half their depth. Also called alto-relievo. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "high relief" in a sentence
  • "Grim dusty armour hung in high relief in front of the dark oaken gallery at the farther end, and under the broad arch of the great mullioned window opposite was spread a curtain of old tapestry, covered with dim melancholy figures, like a dozing indistinct dream of the past."
  • "As for Publius Vagiennius, he was decorated at a full assembly of the army, receiving a complete set of nine solid-silver phalerae, these being big round medallions sculpted in high relief and joined together in three rows of three by chased, silver-inlaid straps so that they could be worn on the chest over the top of the cuirass or mail shirt."
  • "The not very dignified St. Peter, enthroned on a kind of pedestal adorned with a high relief of classic design, of the type which we shall find again in the Sacred and Profane Love, recalls Giovanni Bellini, or rather his immediate followers; the magnificently robed Alexander VI."