Definition of "mace" [mace]

• A ceremonial staff borne or displayed as the symbol of authority of a legislative body. (noun)
• A macebearer. (noun)
• A heavy medieval war club with a spiked or flanged metal head, used to crush armor. (noun)
• An aromatic spice made from the dried, waxy, scarlet or yellowish covering that partly encloses the kernel of the nutmeg. (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 fruit of the nutmeg is undoubtedly swallowed whole by the bird, and to the powers of deglutition is left the separation of the nutritive portion which we know as mace, from the hard and indigestible nut which is voided in flight."
• "The Eastern mace is well known to English collectors, it is always of metal, and mostly of steel, with a short handle like our facetiously called life-preterver"
• "ROBERTS: Now, we mentioned the word mace in the lead-in to this."