Definition of "aiguillette" []

• An ornamental cord worn on the shoulder of a military uniform. (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.

• "Cadets served in the ranks and wore the same uniform as the men; they were distinguished only by an aiguillette of blue and white silk with brass tips."
• "Everything in sight was scree tumble, sloped gravel, blinding patches and streaks of snow, slick shining trickles of ice down gray- and brown-striped, crooked-layered limestone and mica schist, and above it all, the inward-leaning aiguillette peaks—barren stone needles like the newest, sharpest mountains on some moon."
• "His bow to me must have been calculated on a slide rule; it suggested that I was about to be Supreme Minister but was not quite there yet, that I was his senior but nevertheless a civilian-then subtract five degrees for the fact that he wore the Emperor's aiguillette on his right shoulder."