Definition of "baroque" []

• Of, relating to, or characteristic of a style in art and architecture developed in Europe from the early 17th to mid-18th century, emphasizing dramatic, often strained effect and typified by bold, curving forms, elaborate ornamentation, and overall balance of disparate parts. (adjective)
• Music Of, relating to, or characteristic of a style of composition that flourished in Europe from about 1600 to 1750, marked by expressive dissonance and elaborate ornamentation. (adjective)
• Extravagant, complex, or bizarre, especially in ornamentation: "the baroque, encoded language of post-structural legal and literary theory” ( Wendy Kaminer). (adjective)
• Irregular in shape: baroque pearls. (adjective)
• The baroque style or period in art, architecture, or music. (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.

• "The word "baroque" comes from the Italian word "barocco" which means bizarre."
• "The term baroque seems, however, most acceptable if we have in mind a general European movement whose conven - tions and literary style can be described concretely and whose chronological limits can be fixed narrowly, as from the last decades of the sixteenth century to the middle of the eighteenth century in a few countries."
• "Since then the term baroque occurs in English scholarship more frequently."