Summary

1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, Volume 12… (1911)

In music the term is adopted from the French and Italian, and applied to a movement which is solemn or slow. (4) To clean a ship’s bottom in a specially constructed dock, called a “graving dock.” The origin of the word is obscure; according to the New English Dictionary there is no foundation for the connexion with “greaves” or “graves,” the refuse of tallow, in candle or soap-making, supposed to be used in “graving” a ship.
Source: Wikisource

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